


The World's Gonna Know Your Name

by PastelMess



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Drugs, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M, Partying, Tyler's friends are kind of douchebags, Underage Drinking, and by kind of I mean they are, stereotypical jocks versus punks thing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-19
Updated: 2018-07-16
Packaged: 2018-08-16 03:11:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 42,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8084473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PastelMess/pseuds/PastelMess
Summary: Jocks hate punks and punks hate jocks. It's how it's always been since the beginning of school.
 Except Josh has a list of things Tyler needs to complete before his senior year is over, and Tyler has a big fat freaking crush on Josh Dun.





	1. Boys will be Boys

**Author's Note:**

> I'm spitting out the cliche fics lately. Let me have my fun.
> 
> Anywho, I hope you guys enjoy this as much as I do. These are always so much fun to write, especially when I can use some of my own crazy experiences in them.

Of course on his first day of school he was put next to the worst kid in the entire building.

Tyler Joseph, captain of the basketball team, was a jock. He wasn't the dumb-witted stereotypical jock either, no, Tyler Joseph was a straight A, heavily involved student. He took a string of AP classes, sang in choir, was the vice president of student council and an avid church goer. Girls swooned over him, teachers praised him, and his parents trusted him to not do anything bad.

Josh Dun, however, was the exact opposite. Known for his signature look of ruffled dyed hair, silver piercings and gauges, Josh was the definition of a punk. He was known to ditch class, make sarcastic remarks, slack off, and once got caught and temporarily suspended for smoking weed in the school bathroom. He had a very select group of friends and everyone knew not to speak with them.

Which was the exact reason why Tyler wanted nothing to do with him. He had known Josh for a while, after all, they had been in school together since kindergarten. They never spoke with one another, always flocking to opposite social groups. Tyler knew he was a bad kid.

And to make it even worse, their English teacher seemed like the person to keep them in these seats all year. So Tyler was doomed to forever having to work with Josh Dun.

He swiveled around in his seat, trying to catch the attention of his best friend Dallon who seemed to be scowling himself as Brendon Urie sat down next to him. Oh, poor Dallon. If there was anyone worse than Josh Dun, it would be Brendon.

Dallon glanced at him with worried eyes and mouthed “Help me” to which Tyler could only shake his head sadly.

“Oh, don’t be too distraught,” Josh said, drawing Tyler’s attention from Dallon’s pleading look. “I won’t bite.”

“I don’t even know you,” Tyler replied, scooting his chair to the edge of the desk.

“Well, sure is a good thing we’ll have all year to chit chat, huh?” he raised an eyebrow, some of that blue fluff he called hair flopping into his eyes. Tyler scowled and looked back up towards the teacher.

“Welcome back to school everyone, I’m sure you are more than excited to finally be seniors!” she let out a small cheer, eyes scanning the dead crowd for any signs of enthusiasm. “Today we’re going to do some ice breakers and get to know the person you’re sitting with.” The whole class groaned. “Come on you guys, branch out of your comfort zones! It’s your last year of high school! I’ll pass out the worksheets and we can begin.”

The minute Tyler received his he pulled it to the far side of the desk and hid it from Josh’s view.

“Oh, don’t be that way Joseph. What on that paper can I really cheat with?”

“I don’t know,” Tyler muttered, “but you’ll find something.” Josh laughed mockingly as Tyler wrote his name, clean and crisp, at the top of the paper.

When Ms. O’Hara reached the front of the classroom, she smiled. “Alright class, go ahead and speak with your partners, and then at the end of class you’ll be in charge of introducing them!”

“I feel like she used to be a kindergarten teacher,” Josh said with a smile as he leaned back in his chair and put his feet up on the desk. Tyler rolled his eyes and studied his paper.

“Let’s just get this over with. What’s your favourite movie?”

“Sorry Joseph, you don’t get to know that until the third date.” He winked, fingers fiddling with the cuffs of his leather jacket instead of focusing on the assignment. Typical.

“ _ High School Musical 3 _ it is.”

“The second one is so much better though.” Josh’s smirk filled Tyler’s entire body with fury. How the heck was he supposed to deal with this butthole all year long?

“Can you stop goofing off and ask me a dang question?”

A sigh. “I guess Troy Bolton, but you have to tone down the attitude.” He reached for his paper, eyes scanning over the questions. “Favourite sport? Oh that’s easy. It’s badminton, right?”

“Basketball,” Tyler spat through gritted teeth. Yep. He definitely couldn’t do this. So instead, Tyler pushed out of his chair and asked to go to the bathroom, ignoring Josh’s coos from behind him.

“Are you finished?” Ms. O’Hara asked, and Tyler shook his head.

“Can’t get much done.” And with that, he shuffled out of the classroom and into the bathroom at the end of the hall to splash some water on his face. It was only second hour and Tyler already wanted to give up. This year was supposed to be his. He was the definition of involved; student council was going to make the school the best in Ohio, the basketball team was going to win all their championships, and now that was about to be ruined by stupid Josh Dun. 

When Tyler’s phone buzzed in his pocket, he yanked it out in surprise to see Dallon had messaged him.

 

Dal-Pal (8:22 am)

_ Hey, saw u leave. Everything ok? _

 

Tyjo (8:23 am)

_ Josh Dun is making me want to slit my throat _

 

Dal-Pal (8:23 am)

_ Try dealing w/ Brendon. We aren’t getting anything done. _

 

Tyjo (8:24 am)

_ Us either. I’m giving up. _

 

Okay. Back to class.

With a loud groan, Tyler walked back to the classroom as slow as possible, dragging the heels of his shoes into the linoleum floor. Josh was staring at him with that same stupid gross smirk as he made his way back to his chair.

“Welcome back to class basketball captain.”

“Do you have anything better to do with your life than waltz around with a sarcastic response on the tip of your tongue all the darn time?”

“Yikes. Didn’t realize pretty boy Joseph could get this salty. Come on Ty-Guy, can’t we be friends?”

“No, we can’t. Because I don’t like you. I don’t like what you do, or what you stand for, and I hate how you waste all your time. Unlike you, I care about school and my future, and I’m not going to let you get in the way of me having a fantastic senior year. Understand?”

Josh saluted him. “Yes general.”

Tyler groaned.

\---

Luckily for Tyler, after English he had AP Biology and AP World History so he didn’t have to deal Josh Dun and his crazy antics. At lunch, he slid into his usual seat between Dallon and Alex with a sigh.

“Having a tough day?” Pete asked as he slid into his own seat across the table, smiling at Patrick as he joined them. Pete was a soccer player, one of the best too, and Patrick was his best friend and usually hung out with the jocks even though he wasn’t one. He was cool though.

“I think he’s still scarred from English class,” Alex joked, patting him on the back. “New teacher assigned seats and all of us are struggling.”

“I have to sit next to Brendon Urie,” Dallon added, pressing a palm to his forehead, “you know, the school’s number one stoner.”

“Heard he throws some sick parties though,” Patrick grinned as he pulled his lunch out of his bag. “Not that I’d ever go to any of them.”

“And I’m stuck next to Jack Barakat. God save us all.” Alex rolled his eyes as he started picking at his cafeteria pizza. “I’m pretty sure Tyler has it the worst.”

“Josh Dun,” Tyler stated blatantly, throwing his head into his hands. “Their god awful ring leader. I’m going to fail every partner project unless she lets us pick our own.”

“Aww man, that sounds really rough. Could you switch into a different English class? Or ask to move seats maybe?”

“Doubt it. I can’t afford to change up my whole schedule, and O’Hara seems very convinced we need to work with people we don’t know. I know Josh enough to know he’s a slacker and a stoner and a terrible person in general.”

“Eh, just ignore him when you can. You can get through it Tyler. Besides, you’re one of the most popular people in school. If he starts pestering you, literally everyone will step up to stop him, oh dearest point guard.” Pete grinned and Tyler rolled his eyes.

“Hardy har har.”

“I’ll take him down for you Ty.” Dallon nudged him, and everyone burst into laughter.

“No offense Dal, but you’re a stick.”

“But I’m tall! I play center! You guys have seen me take people down during games!”

“This is Josh Dun we’re talking about. This guy is pure muscle and sarcasm. Two things you don’t have.”

“You guys suck.”

The conversation slowed to a gentle babble as the rest of the table filled in. Rian and Zack were in the middle of their own conversation, too absorbed to pay attention to the roasting session of Dallon while Spencer and Andy hopped right in.

“Whatcha talking about?” Spencer asked as he pulled out his sandwich.

“Dallon thinks he can take Josh Dun,” Alex replied for him, smirking as Dallon pouted.

Spencer let out a laugh of his own. “Hah! Good luck.”

“You can’t say anything Spencer, you’re a wrestler. You could crush someone by shoving them into a locker,” Dallon said as he flicked a carrot stick at Spencer’s head, and promptly missed.

“I’ll take him on,” he said proudly, puffing up his chest. “Why are we taking on Josh Dun? Isn’t he that stoner kid?”

“Yep. Tyler’s stuck sitting next to him in English.”

“He’s a dip crap,” concluded Tyler. Everyone nodded their heads in agreement.

“Any other classes with him?” asked Patrick, and Tyler shrugged.

“At the moment, no. But who knows. I still have three more classes. For certain won’t have student council with him.”

“He’s too dumb for that,” Alex snickered.

“I don’t think the problem is that he’s too dumb. I think he just doesn’t try hard enough.” The group turned to look at quiet Andy who hardly ever contributed to the conversations. He raised his hands in defense when he noticed everyone staring at him. “Hey, I’m just being honest.”

“I’ve got music theory with him fourth hour. He sits with Brendon and Gerard. They seemed to sit quiet in that class.” Pete focused on peeling his banana, Tyler watching as he tucked his palm under his chin.

“Maybe he’s got a crush on you Ty. Wouldn’t be surprised. Everyone else in this school does.” Dallon wiggled his eyebrows as Alex fluttered his eyelashes and a warm blush spread across Tyler’s face.

“Shut up you guys.”

“But seriously though. I’m pretty sure he’s gay. You know Brendon Urie is gay. He got caught sucking Ryan Ross’s dick last year in the bathroom stall. You guys remember when he got suspended?”

“That doesn’t mean Dun’s gay.”

“Be honest with yourself. He even looks gay.”

“You can’t look gay.”

“Of course you can.”

“Alright, alright, cool it everyone,” Tyler stopped the conversation head on, not really wanting to think about his seatmate as something he might have not even have been.

“Hey, did you guys see that episode of  _ The Walking Dead _ last week?” And the conversation slowly faded away from Josh Dun.

However, Tyler was still thinking about him and his stupid, somewhat pretty face.

\---

After lunch came student council, a class that Tyler had been looking forward to all day what with him being the year’s VP and all. He quickly forgot all about Josh Dun as the president and his partner Jenna Black explained to the class their plan to up school spirit and increase turnout at sporting events like football and basketball games. They were ecstatic when the teacher and class agreed with their plan.

“Hey you wanna go out tonight and celebrate on a job well done?” She followed him after class as he walked to AP Calculus quickly. Jenna was one of Tyler’s best friends, that was for sure. She also made it very obvious that she had a huge stinkin’ crush on him.

And it wasn’t like Tyler didn’t think she was beautiful or anything, no, he certainly did, but he didn’t have feelings for her, or any girl for that matter. He assumed it was because he hadn’t found the right girl yet.

But, afraid he might hurt her feelings and figuring it would be good to get out of the house, Tyler agreed. “Yeah! That sounds like fun. Coffee, my treat?”

Jenna gasped jokingly, resting the heel of her palm over her heart. “Oh Tyler Joseph, you are quite the gentleman!”

“I aim to please.”

“I’ll drive. Be at your house at 4 pm sharp, okay? I’ll text you.”

“Sounds good!” Tyler waved goodbye as she pushed through the crowds, and he turned to go into Calculus.

There was no sign of Josh, which was great news. But it also brought up the fact of the matter that Tyler was avidly searching for him each class period. Was that his brain telling him that he  _ wanted  _ to have more classes with Josh Dun?

Tyler scoffed. That was ridiculous. Absolutely not.

But the minute he walked into his last hour of the day, Chamber Choir, and noticed that familiar blue fluff across the room, Tyler couldn’t lie that his heartbeat didn't speed up.

Patrick grabbed his shoulders as Tyler set his stuff down. “Do you see who I see?”

“Yeah, a guy I would least expect to have made it into the highest choir in school. I didn’t even know he liked singing.”

“He’s definitely a bass though, so you’re safe on that part. You have a higher voice than most girls.” Patrick busted up in laughter and took Tyler’s punch like a man. “Okay, okay, I deserved that.”

“Bump off,” mumbled Tyler as he took his usual spot in the back row. He caught Patrick’s eye before the dirty blonde reached for his phone.

 

Trick (1:30 pm)

_ Ty’s boyfriend is in choir with us _

 

Dal-Pal (1:30 pm)

_ Omfg _

 

Ur Boy Pete (1:31 pm)

_ U have 2 be kidding _

 

Tyjo (1:31 pm)

_ Ok first off, not my boyfriend. Second, there’s no way he belongs in here??? Probably snuck in or was forced _

 

Alexander the Great (1:32 pm)

_ Yikes someone is salty _

 

Tyjo (1:32 pm)

_ Screw you Alex _

 

With a grumble Tyler exited the group chat and slid his phone into his pocket right as Josh approached him with Brendon at his side. “Well, if it isn’t my good pal Troy Bolton!”

“It’s an honor to meet you wildcat,” Brendon snickered before he winked and offered Tyler a hand. Tyler only glared.

“What the heck do you guys want?”

“Hey, only trying to be friendly.” Josh jabbed a thumb Tyler’s way and spoke to Brendon as if Tyler wouldn’t be able to hear him. “He hates me for some reason. Weird, right?”

“Totally,” Brendon chuckled. Tyler’s fists curled by his sides.

“Anyway basketball boy,” he clasped Tyler’s shoulder, and with a nudge Tyler shoved it off, “I’m so glad we have another class together. Best news all day. Oh, and I dropped my first hour. It used to be Calculus, but I decided I didn’t hate myself. I took study hall.”

Awesome. Another class Tyler would have to suffer in.

“And I thought I’d try my hand at choir. Can’t be too hard, right? I mean, it’s practically a blow off class.”

“That’s it!” Tyler jumped up from his spot on the risers, his fists clenched by his sides. All he could see is red. “Stop it! I know what you’re trying to do and it won’t work!”

Josh played dumb. “I have no clue what you are talking about sweetheart.”

“You are the worst person in this entire freaking school!”

“Tyler!” the whole class slowly turned their heads at the presence of Mrs. Spencer, a sweet older lady in her late fifties. Tyler gulped. “I will not under any circumstances have you insulting another student!”

Josh snickered and Tyler contemplated punching him in the face. “I’m so sorry Mrs. Spencer, it won’t happen again.”

“Now because this is your first infraction in your four years of choir and it’s the first day of school, I’ll let you off with a warning. Please don’t let me hear that again. Choir is a place of peace, not anger.”

“Yes ma’am.” With a red face, Tyler sat down, and tried to ignore the eyes on him.

 

Trick (1:39 pm)

_ Tyler got busted by the teacher for being a dick _

 

Ur Boy Pete (1:40 pm)

_ Fuk get reckt _

 

Alexander the Great (1:40 pm)

_ Dayyyyuuuummm _

 

Tyjo (1:40 pm)

_ I hate all of you _

 

The rest of the class Tyler spent wallowing in his own embarrassment at the fact that he let a low life get to him. They did nothing more than ice breakers and syllabuses, but Tyler couldn’t wait to get home. The minute the bell rang he took off running down the hall and towards the parking lot, thankful the choir room was so close.

He was so close to freedom when there was a tap on neck and an arm tossed over his shoulders. “Hey Bolton.”

“I can’t do this right now Josh.”

“I’m sorry for riling you up in choir. Didn’t mean to get you in trouble.”

“Sure you didn’t.”

“I really didn’t mean to, I swear. I just like seeing your face get all red. It’s cute.”

That made Tyler do a doubletake and he stopped right before he got into his car. “What?”

“I said your face is cute. When you get frustrated.”

“Do you mean that, in like, a gay way?”

“Joseph, what the hell are you talking about?” Josh scoffed. “Basketball players.” He turned to go the other way when Tyler stopped him again. 

“Do you walk home?”

“Yeah.”

“Get in. I’m taking you home.”

“Someone had a change of heart? I likey.” Josh grinned before he clambered into the passenger seat and pulled his seatbelt across his chest. Tyler tried to ignore the fact that Josh was staring at him as he slid on his favourite pair of sunglasses.

“Answer me honestly.”

“If you say so baby boy.”

“Are you gay?” Tyler refused to look Josh’s way as he focused on getting out of the parking lot. Josh let out a bark.

“Ha! Where’d you get that idea?”

“Heard a rumor.”

“You shouldn’t believe everything you hear.”

“Brendon got caught blowing some dude.”

“Well yeah, Brendon’s gay. Have you seen the dude? He doesn’t give a single fuck.”

“So...”

“Why are you so concerned with me being gay or not? Are  _ you _ gay?”

Tyler swallowed thickly. “I don’t know. I don’t think so at least.”

“Well would you look at that. Basketball Bolton is questioning his own sexuality. Now I’d pay to see that High School Musical.”

“Josh, please. I just want to know.”

“Fine. Yeah, I am. You happy?”

Tyler didn’t reply, just continued to focus on the douchebag that just cut him off. 

“Can I use your aux cord?” No answer. “Sweet, thanks.”

The minute the first few notes of  _ Get Your Head in the Game _ rang throughout Tyler’s beat up Taurus, he muted the volume.

“Jeez, sorry.”

“Where do you live?”

“Down this road. Make a left at that tree stump.”

Josh’s house was nicer than Tyler expected. Their goodbyes were almost nonexist as Josh slung his backpack over his shoulder and cleared his throat. “Thanks for the ride.”

“Don’t expect it to happen again.”

“Yeah.” A pause, and Josh looked behind him to make sure no one was listening as a huge smirk rose to his lips. “Can’t wait to eat out that sweet,  _ sweet _ ass of yours.” 

And with that he was gone, leaving Tyler red in the face as his front door slammed shut.


	2. Homecoming: Still a Month Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> High school sucks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updates aren't going to be this frequent, but I wanted to post this because I know I would be able to post a lot more the rest of this week. Thank you for all the positive feedback!

“So I was thinking,” Jenna began as she bit into a banana, “that this weekend we could start making banners and posters for spirit days and try and get the hype up for the football games. I know the games aren’t for a couple weeks but I’d like to start getting the word out there. Do you have practice this weekend?”

Tyler shook his head. “I’m not worried about club basketball this year. Dad’s just having me do school basketball in November.”

“Awesome. That means we can make progress.” Tyler knew Jenna was watching him. He hadn’t really been focusing this whole time, Josh’s last words still on his mind. In fact, Josh Dun had yet to leave his mind. “Everything alright Ty?”

“Yeah. Just thinking about school.”

“It’s the first day. Don’t stress yourself out already.” She chuckled and Tyler only shrugged.

“It’s not school itself. I’m thinking about Josh Dun.” Hey, better to be honest, right?

“Josh Dun?” Jenna repeated with a slight tilt of her head. “Why are you stuck thinking about that asshole?”

“We have a few classes together. He sits next to me in English. I dunno. You’re right about him being an butthole though. Not to mention a slacker and a sarcastic little, well, you know.”

“Don’t let him ruin your big year Tyler. If he’s trying to be your friend, tell him to screw off. Besides, I heard a rumor he’s gay.”

“I’ve heard that too,” he mumbled quietly.

“Maybe he’s trying to make a move on you. Might be a good idea to tell him you don’t swing that way so he doesn’t get the wrong idea. Maybe you could, find a girlfriend or something.” Jenna smiled really big, her rose tinted cheeks growing darker. Ah yes. The not-so-subtle hint.

“Maybe.”

“I just don’t want you losing your mind over this punk.”

“I’m not. I was just thinking about all the work I’m going to have to do to make up for his bullcrap.” Tyler forced a smile, and sighed internally with relief when Jenna seemed to have bought it.

“Maybe O’Hara will end up being one of those teachers who grades each partner’s work separately.”

“One can only hope.”

Later, after Jenna had dropped Tyler off at his house, he tossed his stuff onto the couch, pausing to sit briefly before he headed for the backyard.

“Shoot your hoops,” his father called as he passed through the kitchen. Tyler rolled his eyes.

“That’s what I’m going to do.”

\---

The next morning, Tyler had barely pulled into the school parking lot before a black hooded figure climbed into the passenger seat of his car. The blue scruff protruding from under the hood gave away the identity of the secret intruder.

“Josh?”

“Do, uhm, do you mind if I sit in here? For a few minutes.” It wasn’t hard for Tyler to figure out Josh had been crying. Sure, Tyler hated the kid, but he wasn’t heartless.

“Is everything okay?”

“I’m fine. Do you mind?”

“Uh, no. I have to go in to help with Stuco stuff, so I’ll leave you with the keys. Just give them back during class, if you don’t mind.”

“Thank you.”

Tyler responded with a short nod and left the car quietly, stringing his backpack over his shoulders. It had been Jenna’s idea, through a text at one in the morning, to get donuts to celebrate the new Stuco class. He had reluctantly agreed to get to school early to help set up before everyone stopped by on their way to first hour.

He wondered what on Earth Josh could have been so upset about. The guy had been nothing but shits and giggles the day before, and the two hardly knew one another. Well, Tyler had known Josh’s name since the fifth grade, but they were nothing more than names, and only that. Tyler wondered why Josh hadn’t climbed into one of his friend’s cars, like Brendon or Jack or even Gerard for that matter. Why him?

With a shake of his head, Tyler tried not to think too much into it. That was a flaw of his.

 

Dal-Pal (6:35 am) 

_Why the hell is Josh Dun sitting in your car_

 

Tyler sighed.

 

Tyjo (6:35 am) 

_He seemed upset so I let him_

 

He didn’t bother to wait for Dallon’s reply, just shoved his phone back into his pocket and went into the Stuco room.

\---

“You’re ten minutes late Mr. Dun,” Mr. Green said the minute Josh pushed into the classroom, his hood still pulled over his eyes. “It may be the second day of school but you know where my classroom is.”

“I got lost,” Josh replied sarcastically as he made his way down the aisle, pausing to drop Tyler’s keys noisily on his desk before joining Gerard and Frank at the back. Tyler turned around, watching Josh whisper something to his friends. He was confused beyond all belief. Forget not thinking into it. This was something Tyler wanted to get to the bottom of.

Study hall was a bore, considering there wasn’t much work to be done, and Tyler waltzed into English hoping Josh could give him some answers. Unfortunately, Josh never showed up.

“Okay class, today you’re going to get your first assignment! It won’t be that hard, I promise. As you know, we will be reading several books this year, and you’ll need to know literary terms. Working with your partner, you’ll be assigned a term and will then be in charge of making a presentation for the class. It can be whatever you want, a poster, powerpoint, prezi, whatever. You will be graded on your creativity and accuracy. I’ll pass out the rubrics and instructions right now, as well as give you your terms.”

Tyler groaned. Awesome. A partner project right out of the bag. He figured he’d go with the powerpoint and lose the points for creativity. Tyler wasn’t going to put in twice the work to make up for Josh’s lack thereof.

“Tyler, you and Josh will be in charge of motif.”

“What if he’s not here?”

“We’ll talk about that later.” Ms. O’Hara had already moved on by the time he opened his mouth to complain.

Tyler didn’t see Josh the rest of the day, or the day after that, or even the day after that. His friends could all tell he was distracted, but didn’t say anything to him. Tyler continued to go through his daily routine without worry. Maybe Josh was sick. That was a possibility.

Dallon came over after school on Friday, and the two went to Tyler’s backyard to play a game of Horse.

“You’ve had a lot of your mind this week,” Dallon spoke as he made his shot. The ball bounced off the rim and Tyler rebounded with a sigh of defeat.

“It’s the first week of school. That’s enough on its own.”

“I mean, true, but still. Is it Josh?”

“Why would it be Josh?” It _was_ Josh.

“You haven’t talked about him ever since Monday, even when someone brought him up. And I saw him sitting in your car. Are you guys friends?”

Tyler snorted. “I wouldn’t call it that. I’m just... worried. I think that’s the right answer. He hasn’t been to school all week and I’m a little nervous that he’s chronically ill or something.”

“I get that.” Dallon shrugged, accepting the ball Tyler tossed his way. “You know, Brendon really isn’t that bad. He’s really funny, and pretty nice to me. I kind of expected him to hate me, but he’s alright.”

“And it doesn’t bother you that he’s gay?”

“Of course not. I know my family is Christian and we’re supposed to look down on gay people, but he’s a normal human being. Love is love. I don’t care. Besides, he compliments me more than any girl ever has.” A smirk rose to his lips as Tyler rolled his eyes and grabbed his ball back.

“Jocks aren’t supposed to befriend punks Dal. It’s not exactly status quo.”

“Doesn’t mean we can’t be nice to everyone. That whole ‘I’m popular so I’m gonna be a dick to everyone to make myself feel important’ act that some of us pull is utter BS.”

“It is,” Tyler agreed.

Dallon watched Tyler make a free throw, the ball sliding through the netting with a satisfying _swoosh_. “Maybe you should get to know Josh. He might not be the asshole we all think he is."

“I don’t think-” Tyler stopped the minute Dallon raised an eyebrow. “Yeah. Maybe.”

Later that night, he got out a notebook and scribbled a pros and cons list of befriending Josh Dun. There were far more pros than cons, which had to be a good thing, right? Josh was an a-hole, but Tyler was too. So together, they would have an a-hole friendship. It fit perfectly.

As he reread his list, it occurred to him that he had scrawled down things like “nice hands” and “pretty eyes” under pros without even thinking about it. With a nervous swallow, Tyler pulled open his laptop and typed one thing into the browser.

_I think I might be gay._

\---

The rest of the weekend went by quickly as Tyler helped Jenna make a banner for the upcoming home game that was still a few weeks away. She told him she’d hang it by the student parking entrance, just so people wouldn’t forget.

On Monday when he walked into school, his first thought was that Josh would finally be back. He really wanted to talk to someone about this whole internal struggle twisting around his gut. Those google results had been really thorough and frankly made him worried. As he had sat in church on Sunday, he had felt extremely guilty. Tyler wasn’t supposed to be feeling that way at all. If his parents even remotely found out he had been doing research, he might as well have been kicked out.

But in all honesty, it made sense why he hadn’t had feelings for any girls yet. He could wait all he wanted to, but those feelings would never come.

Josh wasn’t in first hour, so Tyler turned to Brendon.

He tapped his shoulder the minute he walked into the classroom. “Hey, Brendon.”

Brendon looked at him with confusion and scoffed. “What do you want?”

Tyler glanced around the room out of habit, just to make sure nobody was watching this interaction. It didn’t seem like anyone was. “Is Josh okay? He just, he hasn’t been here, and I’ve been worried he’s very sick or something.”

Brendon’s features softened as he slid into his seat. “You’re worried about him? I thought you couldn’t stand him.”

“Yeah, well, about that,” Tyler rubbed the back of his neck red raw out of nervousness and embarrassment. “That’s kind of something I wanted to talk to you about too.”

With a nod of his head, he watched Dallon enter the classroom before speaking. “We can’t do that here. Uhm, I’ll give you my number and you can text me.” He quickly tore off a scrap from his notebook and scrawled down a number, just barely managing to hand it off before Dallon dropped to his seat.

“Hey Bren! Tyler. What’s up?”

“Tyler wanted to talk to you,” Brendon replied with a wave of his hand, but Tyler caught the wink he gave him. Dallon was right, he was a nice guy.

“What’s up?” asked Dallon as he pulled out his laptop and notebook.

“After school sometime this week. Wanna stay after and shoot some hoops?”

“Definitely.”

“Cool.” Tyler smiled, and went to his own seat right as the bell rang. It wasn’t the best thing he could come up with, but it worked.

And now he had Brendon Urie’s phone number.

English was the same as it had been the past week; they worked on their projects. Presentations started tomorrow and Tyler had been done for quite some while. He had done the entire presentation himself, and Ms. O’Hara informed him Josh would have to do a different make up assignment. Which of course kind of sucked for Josh, but if he needed any help Tyler was willing.

He decided to text Brendon, just because the worry was really eating at his insides and he needed to know what was going on with Josh before he exploded. And of course Tyler knew it was really not any of his business, but he still wanted to know, wanted to make sure Josh was completely okay and didn’t have some sort of flesh eating virus.

 

Tyjo (8:36 am) 

_Hey it’s me Tyler_

 

Brendon (8:36 am) 

_Hey. So Josh._

 

Tyjo (8:37 am) 

_Yeah. Josh._

 

Brendon (8:37 am) 

_So Josh’s family is pretty heavily Christian, and his family is really close with Debby Ryan’s family, if you know her. She’s tall, red hair, cheerleader._

 

Tyler’s eyes widened as he read the message. Debby Ryan was one of Jenna’s closest friends. He had talked to her several times.

 

Tyjo (8:38 am) 

_Right, I kno her_

 

Brendon (8:38 am) 

_Well, their families kind of set them up, and they dated for a while. Except, you know, Josh is super gay. But he continued to date her, just because if his family found out, he’d be in some deep shit. I don’t think either of them told anyone they even dated, but Debby really liked Josh, and he felt really bad. So he told her. And she freaked out. Then she went and told his family, and Josh got in big trouble. His dad gave him a black eye, and he got kicked out of the house. He’s been staying with me. As for not coming to school, it’s Josh. He doesn’t really care._

 

Tyjo (8:40 am) 

_And his parents haven’t said anything?_

 

Brendon (8:40 am) 

_I’m sure they have, but he doesn’t care. He doesn’t have a car or anything. They took that away because of his bad grades. Josh has selective hearing._

 

Tyler sighed. Josh went deeper than he could have ever thought.

He glanced back at Brendon, who was lost in thought as Dallon rambled on about their project. Unable to formulate some form of response, Tyler clicked his phone off and laid his head on the desk.

The rest of the day dragged along way too slow. Tyler had a hard time focusing and listening, wanting nothing more just to get home and go to bed. He was too torn over the feelings he had stirring in his brain and the ones he had for Josh. Because he was admitting it now: he definitely and certainly had a crush on Josh Dun.

\---

Later that evening after his basketball session with his father and dinner, Tyler was up in his bedroom watching YouTube videos on his phone. He had been watching videos for almost two hours straight when a text interrupted.

 

Brendon (7:45 pm) 

_I just remembered that there was something else u wanted to talk about. Still want to?_

 

Tyler looked at that text for a solid five minutes, debating whether or not he really wanted to go through with it. It would be good to get some input from someone who knew best, as weird as it was. Tyler really wasn’t someone to share his feelings, but he felt obligated.

 

Tyjo (7:50 pm) 

_So... I think I might be gay._

 

Brendon (7:50 pm) 

_Oh?_

 

Tyler’s phone rang.

He stared at the caller ID for a few seconds, nervous beyond all belief. Tyler didn’t know Brendon all that well. What if he told everyone out of spite? What if he made fun of him, or called him out, or told him to stay away?

With a scoff, Tyler picked up the phone. All those theories were dumb. Brendon wouldn’t do that.

“Tyler?” Brendon’s muffled voice echoed in his ear.

“I’m here.”

“Are you being serious here? You really think you’re gay?”

“Well, I sort of thought that maybe I didn’t have any feelings towards girls because I hadn’t found the right one yet. But then I saw Josh, and I felt something I had never felt before, and I was thinking things that I had never thought of. And I don’t know. Maybe I’m overthinking it. I’m freaking out over this.”

Brendon took a deep breath. “Okay, don’t freak out. It’s okay.”

“I just didn’t know who to talk to about it. Can’t necessarily talk to my friends about it, can I?”

“I’m sure Dallon would understand.”

“I don’t know.”

“I understand the fear Tyler, but it’s alright that you’re feeling this way you know. It doesn’t make you a freak or hinder your ability to do any of the stuff you’re doing now. Just surround yourself with the right people and everything will be fine.”

“Except I can’t exactly do that, and if my parents ever found out I even thought once about kissing a dude I’d get shipped over to Christian boarding school.”

Brendon sighed. “I think a lot of us are in that situation. But you have me, I promise. If you ever need to talk, I’m here. I know we don’t know each other very well, but you trusted me with this information and I’m thankful for that. So yeah. If you need a friend I’m here.”

“Thank you. That really means a lot.” Tyler gnawed on his nails nervously, his eyes flickering to the door. Hopefully no one heard his conversation.

“I mean it when I say Dallon would understand. He’s your best friend, isn’t he?”

“Well yeah, but-”

“I’m not saying you have to come out, but I think taking the time to figure some things out for yourself will benefit you in the future. And if you really like Josh, then be the friend he needs at the moment.”

Tyler took a deep breath. “You’re right.”

“I know I’m right. I gotta go now. See you at school tomorrow?”

“Yeah.”

“Night Tyler.” the phone line clicked off before Tyler could say goodnight back and he let his phone fall into his lap. Brendon was right. He needed to figure some things out.

\---

The next morning a familiar black hooded figure climbed into Tyler’s car.

“Josh!” Tyler exclaimed, falling back against his seat in relief. “I was worried sick about you.”

“Huh,” he muttered, shifting uncomfortably. Tyler noticed he was trying to keep his black eye hidden. “Let’s get outta here Tyler.”

“And go where?”

“I don’t care. Anywhere.”

“I can’t ditch school Josh. I haven’t even seen you in two weeks. We had a project due that I did all by myself and O’Hara claims you have to do a separate assignment.”

He scoffed. “As if.”

“Just come to class today.”

“I don’t really understand why all of a sudden you’re treating me like a human being.”

Tyler shrugged. “I was wrong to be mean to you and I’m sorry.” he sighed. “Look. If you really don’t want to come to school today, then take my car and go somewhere. Pretend I’m there with you. Just be back here to pick me up.”

“Thanks,” Josh whispered, happily accepting the keys Tyler tossed his way. “I appreciate it.”

“I’ll see you at 2:20 sharp.” His hood slipped when he nodded his head and Tyler immediately looked down at his lap as his cheeks flushed red. He couldn’t believe Josh’s father had done that to him.

He wondered if he’d get hit if his parents ever found out about him.

Tyler wandered into school with his attention on his thumbs flying across the keyboard. He needed to speak with Brendon stat.

 

Tyjo (6:55 am) 

_Hey B, Josh was here_

 

Brendon responded almost immediately.

 

Brendon (6:55 am) 

_Yeah I know, drove him to school._

 

Tyjo (6:56 am) 

_He left. In my car._

 

Brendon (6:56 am) 

_Oh fantastic. Thought the kid was actually going to be a normal person. Don’t know why I would ever think that._

 

Tyjo (6:57 am) 

_He wanted me to come with him, but he’s gonna pick me up instead._

 

He shoved his phone in his pocket and made his way down the hallway as Dallon reached for his shoulder.

“Hey! So I know I said I’d shoot some hoops with you this week but I might have to give you a raincheck for that.”

“That’s fine. What are you up too?”

“Family stuff. You know how my family gets.”

“Oh yeah. Good luck.”

Dallon rolled his eyes. “Thanks. I’ll try to keep my sanity. Anyways, see you in English?”

“Where are you going now?” Tyler narrowed his eyes as Dallon started walking backwards down the hallway.

“Gotta speak to a teacher!” he yelled before spinning around to speed walk faster. Tyler sort of wanted to follow him, just to see if he was actually talking to a teacher, but Jenna stopped him. She yanked on his arm, practically dragging him to the Stuco room.

“Jeez Jenna, what is wrong?”

“It’s about Debby. Did you know her and Josh Dun were dating?”

“No,” he lied.

“Well they were. And that rumour was right. He is gay. He’s gay and he broke my best friend’s heart! I’m gonna punch him.”

“Jenna calm down. You’re overreacting here.”

“I’m not overreacting! How could he do that to a person?”

“Maybe he was scared of what his family would say.”

“Are you seriously defending that jerk Tyler? You know how sweet Debby is! You know she doesn’t deserve her heart to be stomped on like that! He should have never led her on like that.”

“I’m sure there is a reasonable explanation here.”

“Tyler Joseph you stop right now!”

“Jenna!” He grabbed her by the shoulders. “Was what he did pretty crappy? Of course. But neither of us know the whole story and until we do there isn’t any point in freaking out about it. You have every right to be mad at him for what he did to your friend. All I’m saying is that he has a side too. Okay?”

She sighed and grabbed fistfuls of her hair. “Okay. You’re right. Sorry. I’m just frustrated and pissed off.”

“I know. It’s okay. Don’t let it completely ruin your day, alright? If she needs to rant or whatever take her out after school for some ice cream. That’s what girls like, right?”

“Oh shut it.” Tyler was happy to see she was smiling. “Sorry for freaking out.”

“That’s what I’m here for. Now I’m gonna head to class. I’ll see you later, alright?”

“Bye Tyler.” She waved as he turned on his heel and marched up the stairs to his first hour.

\---

School went by quickly and the minute the bell rang Tyler was shooting down the hallway with hope that Josh was actually there. He actually thanked God under his breath when his familiar piece of junk was out front. Tyler clambered into the passenger seat and smiled at Josh. He had exchanged his hoodie for a pair of sunglasses and Tyler tried not to stare at his arms. _Gosh_ did Josh have some nice arms.

“Thanks for being here,” Tyler said quietly, pulling his seatbelt across his chest as Josh barrelled out of the parking lot.

“It’s your car. Thanks for letting me use it.”

“No problem.” Tyler took a deep breath, preparing himself for the next conversation at hand. “So... you doing okay? You haven’t been to school in a while.”

“I’m fine. Just not going because school is pointless.”

“Things okay at home?” Tyler tried to ignore that Josh’s nostrils flared and his grip on the steering wheel tightened.

“No offense, but you aren’t going to understand. And I would rather not discuss my life with a complete asshole of a stranger. So how about you mind your own damn business?”

Tyler snapped his jaw shut at Josh’s outburst and turned to look out the window. He hadn’t meant to make him mad. Really all he wanted was to be a person for Josh to lean on.

Josh pulled up to an unfamiliar house and exited the car without another word, throwing the door wide open. Tyler watched him hop the back fence and disappear before he shifted over to the driver’s seat. Great, just great.

He couldn’t do anything right these days.


	3. A Party, 4 Cups of Beer, and Josh Dun

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maybe he doesn't hate Josh Dun as much as he thought he did.

Two more weeks passed by.

By this point, school was starting to melt into a system of tests and quizzes and daily homework assignments, people knew where to sit at lunch and where to park, fall sports started and Tyler spent day after day with Jenna doing Stuco stuff. But  _ god, _ was he distracted.

His friends and Jenna assumed it was the oncoming storm of school, AP classes and whatnot, and it sort of was, but his main problem was the boy he had a huge massive crush on that refused to speak with him.

Ever since his outburst Josh avoided Tyler at all costs. He was  _ hardly ever  _ in English, requesting Ms. O’Hara send him to a classroom where he could get some “assisted help” even though he and her both knew that was complete bull. Yet, she still sent him. Even Brendon refused to speak to him, ignoring all his texts and words, even refusing to look at him. Tyler was so confused to what the heck he had done wrong.

Maybe it was a good thing. He could stick to his own words about staying in his own group. The jocks weren’t supposed to befriend punks, and the punks obviously did not want to be friends with a jock.

Even more frustrating than that was Dallon, who was supposed to be Tyler’s best friend. When Tyler came to Dallon with his problem, Dallon claimed to wait it out, which was  _ not _ helpful. If Tyler stayed this frustrated any longer, his hoop was going to break with how hard he was throwing his free throws.

And then came the day everything changed.

\---

It was the second weekend in September; homecoming was at the end of the month and Jenna was becoming more frantic with the game and dance. The two spent all their free time at school making banners and posters, trying to get people hyped; Jen was working on the design for the tickets with the Stuco sponsor while Tyler was in charge of getting decorations for the dance’s theme - A Night Around the World - which he personally thought was a little bit lame but really wasn’t planning on going to anyways. His friends were excited, already planning their big proposals for whoever they were going to ask out. (Tyler really hadn’t been paying attention.) Of course they claimed he should ask Jenna.

“You know she’ll say yes dude,” Alex grinned, patting Tyler on the back. Tyler only huffed.

He barely got enough sleep as it was with this stupid homecoming crap, so when he was  _ finally _ able to get a night’s worth of sleep, Tyler happily took it. No video games, no YouTube videos, no texts from his friends begging him to go see the newest horror film at the cinema, just plain old-fashioned sleep. And Tyler really did think he was achieving his goal of a boring, sleepful Friday night.

Until some genius started pelting his bedroom window with rocks.

With a groan, Tyler sat up, peeling back the comforter. Zack was spending the night at a friend’s house, so it was only Jay in the bunk beds across from his twin. Tyler was more than happy to see that kid hadn’t woken up.

He checked the time on the phone - about twenty minutes past midnight - and whipped around to the window, ready to groggily yell at the d-bag offsetting his circadian rhythms. However, the yelling never came, because a familiar faded blue haired punk grinned at him when he yanked back the curtain.

After one more glance back at Jay, Tyler opened the window and continued to peer through the screen. “What the  _ heck _ are you doing here?”

“We’re going to party,” Josh said as-a-matter-of-factly. Tyler continued to stare, ignoring the fact that his jaw dropped. Josh Dun, the boy he had a crush on, the punk d-canoe that had ignored him for weeks on end, was standing outside his bedroom window to drag him along to a high school  _ party? _ How did he even know where Tyler lived in the first place?

“Oh no. I’m not going to a party. Goodbye.” He started to close the window when Josh threw his hands out in front of him.

“No, no Tyler wait! Hear me out!”

With narrowed eyes, Tyler folded his arms and huffed. Josh let out a sigh of relief.

“Okay, questions answered. First, you’re probably wondering how I found your place. And the answer is Dallon.”

That backstabbing holy child of God.

“Secondly, Brendon’s parents are out of town, and it’s his famous Back-To-School party. I got a plus one so I’m bringing you.”

“Well sorry, but I’m not going to lower my IQ by stepping into one of those. You’ll have to find someone else.”

“Tyler, come  _ on! _ It’s your senior year dude. You have a checklist you have to fulfill before you graduate. Get laid, get high, get drunk-”

“Uhm, pass my classes?”

Josh rolled his eyes. “Go to a high school party. It won’t hurt to break a rule every once and awhile.”

“The inaccuracy of that sentence hurts me.” Tyler scowled. “Besides, you’ve been ignoring me for, like, weeks on end and frankly I’m a little offended.”

“Okay look. I can explain and apologize and stuff later if you just. come. with. me.”

“Why me?”

Josh threw his hands up in the air with a groan. “For fuck’s sake Tyler! Come on!”

“You don’t have to curse,” he muttered, finally giving in. Maybe letting loose a little would be good for him. “Alright. Give me time to change. And hush. Everyone is asleep, including my little brother in this very room.”

“Thank you! I’ll get the screen off. Hurry up.” Tyler nodded, darting towards his closet to pull out a powder blue button up shirt and his nicest pair of skinny jeans before tiptoeing to the bathroom. He changed quickly, muttering under his breath the whole time. Really, Tyler couldn’t believe he was doing this. His parents  _ trusted  _ him, and if they found out he was sneaking off in the middle of the night with  _ Josh Dun _ to go to a  _ high school p*rty, _ they would tear his head off.

After a few seconds of staring at his scowling face in the mirror, Tyler spiked his hair with some gel and sprayed a bit of cologne before flicking off the light, gathering his pajamas, and rushing back to his bedroom. He closed the door quietly, tucked his pj’s under his pillow, grabbed his phone, and slid on his vans before hopping out the window.

“I hope you know how much I hate you right now,” he muttered, watching Josh close the window and fiddle with the screen.

“Come on dude. You look sexy. Go get yourself lots of pussy.” He swung his head back around to flash a charming smile.

Tyler scoffed. “Yeah, no thanks.” Although if he was being honest, Josh didn’t look too bad himself. He was wearing a loose grey tee that went to his knees, black skinny jeans, maroon Doc Martins and a leather jacket. Not to mention his hair was styled and not tucked underneath a hood or snapback, so Tyler was  _ finally _ able to see the faded colour under the street lamps and even his natural brown in the roots.

“What, are you and that Stuco girl all exclusive or something?” He broke Tyler away from his stance, dusting his hands off as he swiveled back around to present his finished work. “I mean, good for you.”

“Who, Jenna? Oh no, definitely not. You have that all wrong.”  _ Mostly because I like dudes. _

“Huh, interesting. Alright, this way Bolton.” Josh gestured towards the street, and Tyler followed him closely, looking for any sign of a car. He knew Josh had gotten his car taken away and was sort of curious to what he was driving.

Josh brought him to a motorcycle.

“You’ve  _ got _ to be kidding me,” Tyler said the second Josh handed him a helmet.

“Come on Tyler, you aren’t going to die. It’s a short drive anyways.” he grinned, sliding the helmet over his head and straddling the seat. With a sigh Tyler followed suit, tucking his feet up on the pegs before cautiously gripping Josh’s hips. This was definitely the most dangerous thing he had ever done.

Josh revved the engine and they shot off, Tyler’s grip tightening out of fear. Crap, crap, crap. Why was he doing this? What was wrong with him?

A day ago Josh hated him, and now Tyler was on the back of his motorcycle with his arms wrapped around his waist on their way to a place with alcohol and drugs. Oh god, he was going to be in so much trouble.

True to his word, the drive was short, and Tyler spent every second worrying himself to death about the heck his parents would unleash the minute they discovered he was gone. Josh didn’t seem one bit concerned by this party, that snarky grin still plastered on his face even when he pulled off his helmet and set it on the seat.

“C’mon basketball boy, we have places to be, people to see.”

_ Oh crud. _ It suddenly occurred to Tyler at the mention of basketball that if anyone saw him here he could get  _ kicked off the basketball team. _ That was even more excuse for him to leave.

“Josh, basketball-”

“Dude. No one is gonna snitch on you. Scout’s honor. Now we have some things to do while we’re here, alright? Gotta start working on your bucket list before you graduate.”

“Definitely not! I told you-”

“Tyler.” He gently lay his hand on Tyler’s shoulder. “Trust me dude. Please.” 

Tyler sighed in response.

Josh led him up the driveway where the house was already lit up gold with light and thumped with the bass of loud music. Tyler tried to relax and wipe the fear off his face. He didn’t want to get made fun of for that.

Inside, tables and couches had been pushed out of the way for a makeshift dance floor where at least twenty or so people were already grinding on each other, the smell of beer strong in the rather large living room. Josh took Tyler’s hand and led him through the crowd into the kitchen where there were almost just as many people but a lot less grinding.

“Hey Brendon!” he yelled over the roar of the music. “Look who I found!”

“Aye, Tyler, my main man!” Brendon grinned sloppily, his words already slurred with the stench of alcohol. Tyler frowned, his body going rigid when the brunette wrapped his sweaty arms around him. “S-So good to see you bro.”

“Er, yeah.” He peeled himself from Brendon’s arms and took a small step back. Seriously, what the frick frack was  _ going on? _

“Bren, did you leave any of the good stuff?” Josh shook his head in mild annoyance, using an elbow to combat Brendon’s grabbing fingers as he reached for a bottle nestled in between about fifty others.

“Uhm, duh. Oh, and Jack brought his famous brownies.” He winked, stumbling slightly in his step as giggles poured out his mouth. And Josh wanted Tyler to be like that? Yeah, not happening.

“Oh fuck yes.” Josh pushed Brendon out of the way again so he could pour the “good stuff” into two cliche red cups. “The rest of the crew here?”

“Beats me.” Brendon grabbed a beer out of his fridge and stumbled into the living room. Tyler watched him disappear with concern before turning towards Josh to ask him a question and was met with Josh shoving a glass of liquor in his hand.

“C’mon,” he whispered, grabbing Tyler by the sleeve to lead him up the stairs. There were people up here already, but unlike everyone downstairs most of these people were making out.

Tyler’s face turned red. That wasn’t what Josh brought him up here for, was it?

They stopped at a locked room at the end of the hall where Josh pulled a key out of his pants pocket. Tyler had almost forgotten Josh was staying here.

He pushed Tyler inside, locking the door behind him. “This way,” he beckoned, opening up the window. It was screenless and led onto a lower section of the roof that you could gain access to the main part with. Josh pulled Tyler up easily, a smile sliding comfortably back onto his face as Tyler adjusted his position and crossed his legs.

The view was actually quite impressive, Tyler decided.

“So,” Josh started, taking a swig of his drink in between, “guess I owe you an explanation, huh?”

Tyler sniffed his drink and tried to ignore Josh laughing at him. “It won’t kill you Tyler.”

“Uhm, I’m not even going to bring up how  _ wrong _ you are.”

“Fine. One time won’t kill you.” He raised an eyebrow, raising his cup to his lips. With an eyeroll Tyler decided  _ screw it _ and chugged half the cup, coughing and sputtering the minute the liquor touched the back of his throat.

“It burns!” he coughed out, putting Josh in a fit of laughter. He thwacked Tyler on the back a couple of times.

“You’re the one that drank half the cup.”

“You suck.” Tyler wiped his mouth and crossed his arms in some poor form of defiance. Josh shrugged.

“Okay look. Things at my place have been really shitty lately. I’m gay, right? But my parents didn’t know that. So they hooked me up with this girl-”

“Debby,” Tyler interrupted before he realized that he wasn’t supposed to know that. Josh looked at him with something Tyler couldn’t exactly figure out.

“Er, yeah. How did you know that?”

“Jenna told me.” It wasn’t a complete lie.

“Oh. Well, I guess she told you about how I told Debby I was gay and stuff.”

“Well, yeah, they’re friends-”

“I did it because I didn’t want to hurt her feelings any longer, because dude, I knew she was into me, and for some reason my parents were so set on me dating this beautiful Christian girl, hoping she could reform me or some bullshit. So I told her, hoping she’d understand, and she went and told my parents, who were really not happy with that information. My dad’s fist even slipped, can you believe that?” he scoffed. “So I’ve been staying with Brendon. Things are better now.”

“I’m sorry Josh.” Tyler meant it. More and more each day was he sort of convinced his parents might do that.

“I mean, it’s fine now. For real.”

“Well then how about you explain why you were a complete dipcrack to me and then went and ignored me. You left English every day so you didn’t have to sit by me. That’s all kinds of messed up dude.”

Josh let out a rush of air and ran his fingers messily through his hair. “I know. See, I kind of...” he paused, trying to rephrase his sentence. “I was an asshole. I got upset because we were supposed to hate each other, you know? Jocks and punks are like oil and water, and I loved fucking with you. It was funny. But then, you know, you started being nice to me. You let me use your car, you told me what our homework was, thinking I’d do it...” Josh smiled at Tyler’s scoff. “Brendon told me to give you a chance, but I was so frustrated with how things were at home and got this belief that you had this perfect life. Mr. Tyler Joseph, vice president of the student council, point guard on the basketball team, poised tenor in the most respected choir in school. Teachers love you, students love you, no one looks at you and scowls or automatically assumes you’re a slacker or a stoner or calls you a faggot. It was wrong of me to be so rude to you and I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s going on in your life, but that doesn’t mean I had to be a jerk when you tried to help me out with mine.”

Oh wow. That... that was a lot for Tyler to take it. He stared for a few seconds, taking it all in, watching Josh nervously take another gulp of his drink. “Dude, you don’t need to be jealous of me. I’m a goody two shoes nerd. This is about the most exciting thing I’ve ever done in my life.”

Josh laughed. It was cute, his eyes scrunched at the corners and Tyler noticed dimples he hadn’t even known were there. “Glad I could be of some service.”

“It’s okay though. I understand. I’m sorry those things happened to you. Dude, you don’t deserve that, and it’s not cool.”

“That’s why I’m staying at Brendon’s. He’s my lifesaver, even though I kind of dragged him into this mess.”

“I forgive him too.”

“Good.” They sat quietly for a few more minutes, listening to the bass and cicadas around them as they sipped their drinks. Something however, was still bothering Tyler and he really needed to get it off his chest.

“Do you really think I’m straight?”

Josh blinked, obviously in shock by this question. “Well yeah. I kind of figured you asking me that day was a joke, that maybe you were gonna start something or some shit like that.”

“Huh.” Tyler nodded, rubbing awkwardly at his neck. He wondered if by telling Josh that would make it super obvious he had a big fat crush on him.

Josh narrowed his eyes. “Tyler? Are you telling me you aren’t straight?”

“No I am,” Tyler panicked, and that was the worst thing he could have ever done. “I mean, yeah.”

With a nod, Josh finished off his beer, crushed the cup in his hand and tossed it off the roof, watching it bounce off the hood of someone’s car. Tyler did the same thing, his face still red. He couldn’t believe he had blatantly lied to Josh’s face. Tyler definitely was not straight and now Josh was convinced he was. This was awful. “So, you wanna head back inside, grab another drink? You get drunk tonight and we can cross that off the list.”

Tyler chuckled quietly. “Yeah, sure.”

“Ty.” Josh nudged him, his face full of worry. “You being straight and I being gay, that’s not gonna mess up our friendship, is it? I mean, do we have a friendship?”

He shrugged. “Yeah, I would like to call you my friend. We just gotta-”

“Not tell anyone, right.” 

“And-”

“Act like we hate each other. I got it.” They were sitting so close to one another at the moment, their thighs pressed up together, that the two could have kissed if Tyler hadn’t been such a stupid idiot. He decided that getting drunk and in trouble was the least of his worries.

“Get me drunk,” Tyler whispered, to which Josh nodded his head.

“Yeah, okay.”

\---

It turned out Tyler’s alcohol tolerance was utter bologna. 

He was 4 cups of beers in and very,  _ very  _ drunk, which completely changed him into a brand new person. No longer was he the uptight, goody two shoes vice president, but some happy giggly wild card.

“Joshie,” he slurred, swaying on his feet until Josh was able to stabilize him, “you, you my friend, are so pretty.”

Josh rolled his eyes. He had only had one drink of his own, being cautious that he had to drive Tyler home. “You’re just saying that.”

Tyler gasped in horror. “How could you think that?” He leaned forward, bopping Josh on the nose and bursting into a fit of giggles when Josh swatted his hand away. “You are pretty. So very, very pretty.”

“Well thank you Tyler.”

“M’Welcome. I’m thirsty.” He reached for another beer off the kitchen counter, whining when Josh pulled him away.

“Dude, you are going to have quite the hangover already. Let’s not make it worse.”

Tyler stuck his bottom lip out in a pout and tore away from Josh’s grasp. “I wanna dance then.”

“We can do that.” Josh let Tyler drag him into the living room where the pick of the night was some electronic dubstep remix thing people were screaming to. Tyler grabbed Josh’s waist, clenching his nails into fabric tightly. With a tight smile Josh placed his hands on Tyler’s shoulders and together they swayed back and forth, like it was some slow song playing instead of dance music. Tyler didn’t seem to mind though, that loopy grin never leaving his face as he looked around at all the people and lights.

“This is fun.”

“Yeah.” Josh grinned. Although Tyler had turned into a handful, he couldn’t deny that the jock was adorable.

In fact, he was so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t even notice Tyler trying to kiss him.

His lips sloppily touched Josh’s, alcohol strong on his breath, and Josh shoved him away. Tyler didn’t seem phased by it. “I wanna kiss you cause you’re pretty. Let me kiss you.”

“Dude, no.” With a grunt Josh pulled Tyler out of the crowd and out the front door, still pushing away Tyler’s hands. “You aren’t yourself right now. Besides, you’re straight.”

“Am not,” he argued.

“Are too. If you decide you want to kiss me when you’re sober then I am  _ not _ gonna turn you down. But for now, we can’t kiss. Okay?”

Tyler nodded, and then turned to puke into a bush. Josh sighed.

\---

By the time Josh took Tyler home the sun was just starting to rise.

After the kissing incident, Tyler had spent an hour puking, and Josh had steered him upstairs to the toilet. He brought him water and a towel, rubbing small circles into his back as Tyler continued to retch. In all honesty Josh hadn’t meant for Tyler to get this sick.

Back at Tyler’s house, Josh removed the screen and opened the window, watching Tyler’s little brother for any signs of movement. When the coast seemed clear, he helped Tyler in and sat him down on his bed.

“I’m sleepy,” he murmured. Josh nodded.

“I’m sure. You can go to bed real soon, alright? I’m gonna get you comfortable. Don’t want you sleeping in jeans.” So he pulled off Tyler’s shoes and jeans as gently as possible, reaching under the pillow for Tyler’s pajamas. He helped the younger boy push and pull into them before fumbling with the buttons on his shirt. And  _ finally, _ when Tyler was all tucked under the covers with his eyes closed and breathing slowing, Josh smiled.

“I had fun tonight Ty.”

“Mmmm, fun.” Tyler echoed.

“Sleep tight buddy.” Josh bent down, pressed a soft, fluttering kiss to Tyler’s forehead, and shifted back through the window, fixing the screen and disappearing like he was never even there.

\---

Tyler woke up around one in the afternoon with a roaring headache. He sat up in bed, entangling one hand in his hair, and tried to remember what exactly had happened the previous night. (Well, more like earlier in the morning.)

His gaze went towards the window, which looked perfectly normal. 

Look, Tyler knew he went to a party and drank a ton, but that was about the extent of it and it worried him greatly. What had happened with Josh? He didn’t have a number or anything to contact him with.

But  _ jeez _ did Tyler feel like crap. He never wanted to drink again.

He lay himself back down for a few moments, hoping it would calm his headache, before the thought crossed his mind to get up and go get some ibuprofen. Tyler had just stood up when his brother barrelled into the room, slamming and locking the door behind him. Tyler watched curiously as Zack caught his breath.

“Dude.”

“Dude!” Zack yelled, leaning up against the wall. “You were at Brendon Urie’s party last night.”

“What?” Tyler’s eyes blew wide at the same time his heart skipped a beat. He specifically remembered Josh telling him no one would find out.

“Bro, I’m not going to tell mom or dad. I was there too.”

“You were not!”

“Was too! Did you really think I was at a friend’s house? I mean, I was, but we both went to the party. Urie is known for his sick parties, so we  _ had  _ to go. I just, I didn’t expect you to be there, what with your perfect little image you’re always trying to protect.”

Tyler narrowed his eyes. “I don’t have some perfect little image to protect.”

Zack scoffed. “Dude, you totally do. You go to bed when mom and dad tell you cause you’re afraid of getting in trouble.”

“Well obviously I’m trying to branch out of my comfort zone.”

“Aren’t gonna get very far showing up to a party only to disappear upstairs. What were you doing, hiding?”

“Was I alone?” If Zack knew about Josh, Tyler was really screwed.

“Uhm, yeah? Jeez, did you really get that high?” He laughed, obviously pleased with his joke. Tyler rolled his eyes. His brother could be such a butthole sometimes. 

“Drunk actually. Really drunk. I have such a bad hangover right now.” Zack scoffed, obviously not believing that at all. 

“Yeah, okay Tyler, sure. Anyways, mom wants you up so you can shoot your hoops.”

“Right,” he muttered, reaching for some fresh clothes out of his dresser. “Thanks for making my mood Zack.”

“Anytime asshole.” One grin later, Zack left the room with a slight skip and Tyler went to go throw some more aggressive hoops.


	4. Taco Bell is Much Better Than Homecoming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The funny thing about lying is that it tends to spiral into something bigger, and Tyler finds this out firsthand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really glad you guys are enjoying this! It's good to turn my high school experiences into something a little bit better.

On Monday, Tyler got to school a whole twenty minutes early, not because he had to for Stuco stuff, but because he was secretly hoping Josh would crawl into the passenger seat of his car.

Unfortunately, twenty minutes passed, and Josh did not show up.

So with a long sigh, Tyler killed his ignition, shoved his keys deep in his pocket and shuffled slowly to the Stuco room to find Jenna.

She was talking to a few other committee members, Hayley and Melanie to be exact, as they compared the streamer samples Tyler had retrieved the previous week. Jenna perked up when she noticed Tyler across the room.

“Tyler!” She beamed as he slid his backpack off his shoulders and joined the rest of the group. “Dude, good job on the streamers.”

“Uh, thanks.”

“So Tyler, you know this already, but we were planning on lining the gym walls with flags from different countries since the theme is a night around the world. Brown is contacting some businesses, seeing if they could get us some catering.” Mr. Brown, the student council teacher and sponsor, was perhaps the coolest teacher in the world.

“That’s an awesome idea,” Hayley squealed, grabbing Jenna’s shoulder tightly.

“We still gonna string up fairy lights?” Melanie asked, to which Jenna scoffed. 

“Of course. The catering room is going to be in the small gym, that way we can decorate that hallway in between. Tyler, you can handle that, right?”

“‘Course boss.”

“I’m so glad you’re my VP.” Jenna smiled a smile so full of lust that it caused Tyler to blush and look down. “We’ll think of a theme for that later. Maybe we could do like different sections from different countries. I wonder if we could get the class officers to decorate those and have some sort of contest. Whoever wins gets like 500 or so spirit points.”

“That sounds amazing.” Melanie scooted closer to Jenna, smiling politely in the process. These girls were so infatuated with being Jenna’s friend that sometimes it freaked Tyler out a little bit.

“That would definitely get people to participate,” Hayley agreed.

“You guys wanna work on spirit week too?” asked Tyler to put in some form of participation. All this stuff was such a pain for him, especially because he wasn’t even going to attend.

“Oh yeah! We gotta make those banners. I know a bunch of students put in suggestions for this year. We should do like different themes to match the homecoming theme. Like, Hawaiian day or ‘Murica day. We’ll get that figured out during Stuco hour. Ty, you busy after school?”

“Nope,” he said. “I’ll be here.”

“Sweet. You guys are the best. This is going to be the best homecoming ever.” The bell rang right as she finished, and after a round of “goodbye” and “see you later,” Tyler took off upstairs for study hall. He kept an eager eye out for Josh and about passed out when he caught him laughing with Frank and Gerard. His hair was an unruly mess, eyes crinkled at the corners, beaming a dimpled, shiny white smile and Tyler felt more gay than he ever had in his entire life.

The two shared a smile when Josh caught Tyler looking at him before the jock dropped into his chair and tried to shake the blush off his face.

For once, he actually had homework to do, so Tyler pulled out his calculus assignment and got to work.

\---

“Hey there loser.” Josh grinned as he caught up to Tyler’s fast pace to English. “Do you remember that time in the fifth grade when you broke your arm playing kickball because someone kicked the ball behind them and it hit you in the face?”

“Oh god,” Tyler laughed, because when he had to go to the nurse and explain to her  _ how _ he broke his arm, the look on her face was priceless when he told her a ball hit his head had made him fall off the bleachers, breaking his arm in the process. “Why are you bringing that up?”

“Cause you cried and it was funny.”

He scoffed. “Aren’t you just the nicest person. Laughing at a little kid’s pain.”

“Okay, but I was the same age as you.”

“Alright fine.”

“Actually I wanted to know if you were busy today after school. Got somewhere I wanna take you.”

Tyler ignored the flutter of his heart. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.” When they reached the stairs, Josh adjusted the straps of his falling backpack and sneered jokingly. “Man, get away from me you weird jock.”

“Nobody ever wants to be around you dumb punk,” he retaliated, ducking his head to hide the smile that involuntarily rose to his lips.

In English they received copies of  _ Beowulf _ and listened to Ms. O’Hara drone on through boring notes. Tyler rested his head on his open palm and tried to keep his head from slipping.

“Man, this sucks,” Josh muttered under his breath, sliding down his seat until only his head could barely be seen from above the desk.

“There isn’t even a point to taking notes,” Tyler whispered back, gesturing to his open notebook he had abandoned to try and sleep instead, “she posts the powerpoint online with all the same information.”

“I don’t even take notes in the first place. You’re wasting your time basketball boy.”

“Mr. Dun, please pay attention.” O’Hara glared at the pair before returning to her boring presentation. Josh rolled his eyes at the people that looked at him and pulled himself back up his chair before elbowing Tyler. 

“Listen, what are you doing after school?”

“Nothing,” Tyler said immediately. “I’m free.”

“Right on. We’re gonna take your car. The cycle is at Brendon’s and my car is still not my car.”

“Where’d you get that anyways?”

“Bought it myself. Wanted one. Found it pretty cheap, fixed it up and stuff.” He shrugged, like it wasn’t a big deal.

“That’s cool.”

“Not as cool as you.” He smiled, batting his eyelashes like some infatuated cheerleader and Tyler rolled his eyes.

“I gotta be home by 5:30 for dinner and basketball.”

“Deal.”

\---

“How’s English coming along?” Pete asked as Tyler slid into his seat and unzipped his lunchbox. He had a turkey sandwich and a Dr. Pepper today.

“It’s alright. Josh is still a punk,” Tyler yawned, pretending like it was no big deal and bit into his sandwich.

“Still giving you a hard time?” Dallon flashed a smirk on his way down into his bookbag and came back up with a statistics book. “Remind me why I punished myself with AP Stats again.”

“Wish I could answer that,” Tyler responded with his full mouth. Dallon scrunched his nose up and reached back down for a pencil. “Josh is interesting. That’s all I’m gonna say.”

“You haven’t talked about him in a while,” Alex joined the conversation, sitting down in his usual spot next to Tyler. “What’s that about? Nothing to complain about?”

“Has he come onto you at all?” Pete stared intently, trying to figure Tyler out. He could feel a blush rising to his nose and ducked his head to avoid Pete’s intense gaze.

“I mean, not really. He just, he doesn’t do his work and stuff, but I’ve talked to O’Hara about it. She’s grading partner projects separately for the time being.”

“That’s good!” Patrick cheered. Tyler nodded.

“Yeah, my grade won’t be completely in the toilet. Besides that really, Josh doesn’t talk to me unless he has some smart butt reply or is feeling frivolous.”

“Classic punk thing to do,” Alex scowled, dragging his fork through a heaping pile of school mashed potatoes. “I swear Jack is always high or something. The dude always smells like booze. He needs to shower more or something.”

“Gross,” Dallon added without looking up from his stats homework.

“So Ty, I overheard Jenna talking to her buddies about homecoming court,” Alex patted Tyler on the back harshly and leaned forward on his elbows. “I think you two might be nominated. You know the power she holds.”

“Yeah, she’s the president of student council dumbass,” Pete threw a french fry at Alex’s head, who caught it and tossed it at Dallon. The table burst into pointless laughter at Dallon who huffed and tossed the fry on the ground.

“Jerks,” he muttered, pulling his notebook closer to him.

“Just because we’re nominated doesn’t mean I’m going to homecoming with her,” Tyler pointed out in annoyance. He hated how his friends kept trying to get him to ask her out. He didn’t like her that way at all.

“Come on bro, it’s your  _ senior year! _ Whatever happened to the best year of your life?”

“It can still be the best year of my life without me attending a crappy three hour dance in our school gym.”

“It’s for the experience man. Don’t be a jackass. You’re in student council, you should be excited about this. It’s a chance to get a girl to grind on you, and then you go to a party and get high off your ass and have sex. It’s fun.” Alex was doing a horrible job at convincing Tyler what “fun” was.

“That sounds even more awful,” he replied.

“You’re such a pussy Tyler. There’s more to life than your GPA and a relationship with your parents. I’m pretty sure you’re the only one at this table who is still a virgin.”

Tyler’s face twisted in offense. “Not true.” Everyone went silent, looking everywhere besides Tyler’s pouting face. He shifted towards Dallon. “Even you?”

Dallon shrugged.

He groaned and buried his face in his arms. “You have  _ got _ to be kidding me.”

“That’s why we’re all saying to hook up with Jenna. She’s hot, she’s into you, and you could finally lose your virginity like everyone else. It’s not gonna kill you. Besides, we all know what colleges and shit we’re going into. It’s not like you’re going to lose your scholarship for being a normal high schooler.”

“I’ve had girlfriends before,” he tried to argue, but Alex shot him down again.

“Those weren’t real relationships Tyler. They were, er...”

“Horribly awkward?” Spencer finished for him, finally adding his own input. Everyone nodded their heads in agreement and Tyler groaned again.

“I need new friends,” he muttered. 

\---

After school, Josh met Tyler at his car where the two clambered in, Josh in the driver’s seat and Tyler in the passenger. “Do I get to know where we’re going?” Tyler questioned as Josh fiddled with his aux cord. He was getting a little nervous watching the car swerve on the road.

“Nope. Listen to this song though. It’s sick.” He hit play and let his phone clatter into a cup holder. “It’s called ‘We Don’t Know.’ One of my faves too.”

Tyler nodded along to the song as he glanced out the window. “I like it. I don’t really listen to a whole lot of music. My parents are super weird about the music I get to listen to.”

“Mine too. I had to resort to hiding  _ Green Day _ CDs under my mattress so they wouldn’t find out. Too bad my dad found them and broke the discs in half.” He scoffed. “I know they mean well, but it’s fucking annoying sometimes. It’s music.”

“Yeah,” Tyler agreed, even though he didn’t relate a whole lot. Music wasn’t something he had thought a lot about. Sure, he loved to sing, and choir was something he enjoyed a lot, but he hadn’t thought much about the stuff he liked to listen to. He sort of just existed in a world full of talented people.

“I’m not going to college anyways, so at this point I’m kinda like, ‘who the fuck cares,’ you know? I can’t wait to get out in the world and do my own thing.”

That got Tyler to whip his head around and stare at him with wide eyes. “You aren’t going to college?”

Josh snorted. “Hell no. It’s a waste of my time. All this standardized conservative bullshit pisses me off. Take this test, take this other test, fill these out, spend all this money, and for what? So you can spend the rest of your life paying off student loans for a low level job? We aren’t all going to be doctors and lawyers. So I figured I’m going to do what I wanna do with my life and not blow the cash.”

Tyler’s head spun at that. He had taken the ACT four different times to get his score of 33, had applied to countless scholarships for basketball and his academics, and pretty much had a full ride to Ohio State in the bag. He really had no clue what he wanted to do with his life, but the fact that he was college ready was all that mattered to him.  _ Everyone _ went to college. “What do you wanna do?” His tongue felt numb.

“I wanna do music. I love it. It’s my entire life. I wanna play shows with a bunch of sweaty dudes and I wanna travel to states I’ve never been to and play to people I’ll never see again. I wanna get drunk and high and party. Fuck man, there’s a lot you don’t know about me. I play drums, first off. Think I neglected to tell you that. Second off, I didn’t take choir for a blow off class, not really. I can’t sing for shit, and I really don’t like it, but it’s the music I wanna be around. And you too.”

He blinked. “You took choir for me?”

“Pretty much. Wanted to be around you.”

“You gotta audition for chamber though. It’s prestigious.”

“Guess I’m just that good.” He smirked, and Tyler turned to look back out the window. What was he supposed to say to that? “Sorry. I don’t wanna make you uncomfortable.”

“You aren’t making me uncomfortable, I promise.” Tyler still didn’t turn back around, too occupied with the cars passing them on the highway.

“Are you a fast food person?”

“I won’t ever turn down food.”

“Sick.”

\---

They pulled into a Taco Bell parking lot only minutes later and Tyler stared at Josh like they had pulled up to Disneyworld. “No way.”

“You like Taco Bell?”

“More like I  _ love _ Taco Bell.”

“Hell yeah.” Josh grinned as he clicked his seatbelt off. “Glad to know we got that in common.” He led the way into the building, shoving Tyler’s car keys into the pocket of his jacket. They ordered a plethora of tacos, burritos, even some gordita crunches, before dropping down into a table tucked nicely into the corner.

“So,” Josh started, peeling off the wrapper of his first burrito and drizzling it with three packets of mild sauce, “how’s school?”

Tyler shrugged. “Alright I guess. Class is always going to suck, but so far they haven’t been that bad. It’s only September though, so who knows.”

“Mm,” he nodded, swallowing his first bite. “How’s student council?”

A huff. “Don’t even get me started. Homecoming is driving me nuts. We have so much crap to get done and not enough time to do it.”

“When’s homecoming?”

“End of the month. Sounds like a lot of time, but it’s not.”

“You going?”

“What, to homecoming?” Josh nodded. “Probably not. I never really understood the hype of school dances. They kind of suck.”

With a hand jokingly clutched over his heart, Josh let out a mock gasp of terror. “Tyler Joseph, vice president of Student council and point guard of the basketball team, how could you say that?”

Tyler rolled his eyes and snorted. “Doesn’t matter how involved I am. I can still hate things.”

“But you’re going to be nominated for homecoming king!”

“Why does everyone keep saying that?”

“Dude. Look at yourself in the mirror. I appreciate you not being full of yourself but you’re fucking attractive dude. Do you not see the way girls stare at you with all that lust in their eyes? Or how the guys tremble over their words because they want to talk to you  _ so _ badly?”

“No, because that stuff doesn’t happen.” He ignored the fact that Josh had called him attractive. “I play basketball because I like it and it got me scholarships and onto a D1 team. I’m in student council because I like our school and I want to make it better. I’m in choir because I enjoy singing. Everything I do has a purpose. I’m not in it for popularity.”

“Alright, alright, I’ll lay off.” with a smirk, Josh reached for another burrito. “How’s Jenna?”

“We aren’t exclusive. We aren’t even dating. Once again.” Tyler went straight for the argument, tired that everyone was assuming that. They were friends, and only friends.

“I’m just messing with you dude, chill. And eat a burrito. If I eat them all I’ll lose my beautiful physique.” Josh’s grin widened, causing Tyler to roll his eyes once more. He reached for a gordita crunch with a tiny sigh. For some reason he didn’t have much of an appetite. His stomach had been clenched all day with worry; worry he wasn’t sure was there in the first place.

Josh watched him take the first bite before he relaxed a little.

“When’s homecoming again?”

“October 1st.”

“That’s not really the end of September, now is it?” Josh raised an eyebrow mischievously.

“Close enough,” Tyler shrugged. “Why?”

“No reason.” And he went back to working on his third burrito.

\---

Tyler got home around five that night and went right out into the backyard to shoot his baskets. He had just finished 200 when his phone rang.

“Where the hell were you?” Jenna’s panicked voice yelled from the other end, and he pulled the phone away from his ear a little. “You said you were going to help with posters. Tyler, homecoming is in two weeks and I’m freaking the fu-, sorry, heck, out! I’ve been trying to contact you since school ended!”

_ Crap. _ Tyler knew he had forgotten something. He took a brief moment to scroll through his notifications and noticed he had ten text messages and seven missed calls from Jenna.

He was so  _ infatuated  _ with a punk he thought he had hated since middle school that it was starting to distract him from the things he actually had to do in life. “Crap Jen, I’m so sorry. I’ve been so distracted lately.”

Jenna took a few deep breaths. “It’s okay. Melanie and Hayley helped me with some of them. Just, can you please stay after tomorrow? I’m getting nervous. We’re so behind.”

“The dance is going to be fine, I promise. You’re doing a wonderful job.”

That seemed to relax her a little bit. “Thank you Tyler. God, I have no clue where I would be without you.”

“Probably without your head,” he said teasingly, nudging the basketball at his feet. Jenna giggled.

“Probably. Oh hey, so I assume because we’ve been pretty busy you haven’t had time to create anything to ask me to homecoming, and I just wanna say that I don’t care about all that fancy stuff I see on Pinterest all the time. So just make sure your boutonniere is purple because that’s the colour of my dress.” She let out a tiny squeal. “I’m so excited! Senior homecoming. I’ve waited so long for this. I’ll have to add you to the group chat with Debby and everyone else. Oh, do you think Dallon would want to come with us? I know he’s your best friend and everything. And Tyler! We were nominated for homecoming king and queen! Brown and I were going through the nominations today during lunch. The nominees are going to be announced tomorrow, but I’m so freaking excited I just had to tell you now.”

Tyler’s skin had been growing pale during the duration of her one sided conversation, and now his mouth felt like it was full of so much cotton he couldn’t get out the words he wanted to say. “Jenna-”

“Anyways, you’re probably busy or something, so I’ll let you go. See you tomorrow!” The phone clicked off before he could get another word out, and Tyler slowly lowered himself to the cement and stared up at the sky, letting his basketball roll into the grass. The sky was particularly blue today.

He focused on his breathing, trying to calm himself down, but that wasn’t working. 

_ Oh no,  _ he thought, the worry in his stomach bubbling even more. It felt like it was destroying his insides. Tyler couldn’t tell her no now, that would break her heart. Maybe they were going as friends. Yeah, that was probably it. He hadn’t given her any signs that he was into her, so there was no way she could have taken it the wrong way. They were going as friends, and as much as he hated homecoming, he could make it fun. Besides, this was  _ his _ year to shine.

Everything would be okay.


	5. Tyler Messes Up Big Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> homecoming is perhaps the worst thing in the entire world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is so late! I've been super busy lately with school and work.

Walking across the gym with Jenna on his arm was pretty much the last thing he wanted to do at a school assembly.

He felt nervous, so much anxiety twisting inside of him like a coil, as the two walked. And it wasn’t like it was the first time Tyler had spoken in front of the whole school; no, he had done it last year for basketball and would most likely do it this year as well. It was just awful is all, because his friends were cheering and making obscene gestures and sprouting smug grins that shouted “Told you so” and Josh’s face was one of... betrayal.  _ But he knew, he’s known this whole time, why does he look so upset? _

Tyler wanted to scream.

That had been weeks after the two had gone to Taco Bell; on Tuesday when the nominees for homecoming court were announced during 8th hour, hollering filled the room as all the boys congratulated Tyler. Even Josh had flashed him a charming smile.

“What’d I say dude?” He poked Tyler in the side before returning to his place with Brendon, because punks didn’t talk to jocks and jocks didn’t talk to punks. 

And after that, Tyler hardly ever had time to talk to Josh, because he was busy busy busy with homecoming and all that jazz. Now that he was going, he had to find a suit, and buy a ticket, and make sure everything was okay with the group he was going in. Jenna was  _ constantly _ freaking out about every little thing, about how the “ambiance” of the gym didn’t match the theme, or how one particular place she had asked to cater had decided they no longer wanted to. He tried his best to calm the blonde down, because she was his friend, and that was his job as the vice president of student council.

His friends all knew by now that he was going to homecoming with Jenna, and no matter how many times he tried to tell them that it had been  _ her _ idea, no one ever believed him. “We told you so,” they said, and Tyler would give up and pout. Dallon was no help either, usually lost in his own world or absent from his place at the table. He never answered any of Tyler’s texts when the question “hey where are you?” was muttered.

“I’m not going to homecoming,” Dallon told Tyler the fourth time Tyler had asked. He frowned.

“Why not? I thought you were.”

“Had a change of plans. Besides, you were right. It is stupid. At least you have a date.”

“Dallon, you of all people should know I did not want to go with Jenna. Why won’t anyone believe me? You’re my best friend. You’re supposed to believe me.”

He shrugged. “You guys have always been so close, I just think-”

“Well you think wrong,” Tyler snapped, his hands shaking by his hands, and with a glare Dallon slammed his locker shut and stomped away.

So that was the reason the two weren’t talking.

Tyler didn’t have Josh’s number to contact him with, and Brendon ignored Tyler’s texts; anytime he tried to catch him in the hallways Brendon would say “I have somewhere to be,” or “can’t talk now.” Even Josh was acting weird about the whole thing, and it was starting to stress Tyler out. He was already a mess thinking about everything he had gone through the past two months, like the fact that he knew he was very obviously attracted to men and if his parents ever found out he would be beaten and sent to boarding school. Plus, his church had come to him about a job, which only made him feel guiltier. And he knew he shouldn’t have been feeling guilty, because that’s just who he was, but he did, and had no one to talk to about it.

The homecoming assembly was the day before homecoming; 7th hour was cut short for extra time (although Tyler had to be there far earlier for Stuco, and because he was a, er, nominee) so the school could be ushered in. He had dressed nicely for this in a button up shirt and khakis, Jenna in a chic black dress next to him. She looked beautiful of course, but that didn’t help Tyler’s worries at all. He just begged that it would be another set of nominees to win the court, not him and Jenna.

“You ready for this?” She grinned at him, laying a hand gently on his shoulder. Tyler nodded his head and swallowed nervously.

“Yeah. I’m ready.”

“You’ve seemed really stressed these past weeks, and I’m sorry if I had anything to do with that.”

She had literally  _ everything _ to do with that, but Tyler would never say that out loud. “No, you’re fine. It’s just problems with my friends is all. They’re kind of being jerks.”

“So no Dallon then?” Tyler had told her this three times.

“No Dallon.”

Her hand slid down his arm and brushed his palm. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. Let’s just get this over with.”

Tyler tried to get Josh’s sad face out of his head when he pressed a kiss to Jenna’s cheek and continued walking her across the gym.

\---

The next morning the Stuco team arrived at school at 8 am to start preparing for the dance. They had to string lights, streamers, put out tables and chairs and make sure the catering room was clean and ready for the deliveries.

Tyler was tired. He had tossed and turned all night and came in looking like a zombie, which Jenna immediately pointed out. “Ty? You okay? You look sick.”

“Just tired.” He yawned in the middle of speaking. “I’m fine. Let’s get to work.”

She looked at him curiously, but nodded her head. “I’m leaving at noon to go get my hair done. You okay to finish everything up?”

“Yep,” he nodded.

“Good. Thank you for everything Tyler, I really do appreciate it.” Jenna smiled and clapped her hands together to address the rest of the group. “Alright guys, let’s get going!”

Preparing for the dance turned out to be a great distraction for him. He knew later that night he’d have to stand in a crowd of strangers for three hours, but for now, there was so much to be done that by the time noon rolled around and Jenna left to go get her hair done, Tyler was nervous they weren’t actually going to finish.

“Don’t you guys have stuff to do today?” he asked Melanie and Hayley, who both shrugged.

“I’m not going,” Melanie said. “I’ve always thought homecoming was stupid.”

“And I’m going to go see a movie with my boyfriend,” added Hayley. Tyler sighed loudly, nodded as a poor attempt at a response and turned to go into the small gym to finish off the catering room. Really he just needed some time to himself to think about what the heck was  _ really _ going on in his life.

Except when he walked into the gym Josh was sitting at one of the tables with his feet propped up. He raised an eyebrow when Tyler looked at him.

“What are you doing here?” Tyler asked in disbelief. He busied himself with a fallen set of fairy lights on the other side of the gym to hide his blush.

“Came to help,” Josh replied, suddenly behind him. Cold fingers brushed his neck, causing Tyler to pull away. “You okay?”

“I’m just stressed,” Tyler told him, just like he had been telling everyone else. “Homecoming is terrible. I don’t even want to think about what prom is going to be like. I’ll think about that horror when the time comes.”

“At least after today you’ll be done with it.”

“Yeah, still gotta suffer through this atrocity tonight.” With a sigh, Tyler dropped down into one of the chairs resting against the back wall. “School sucks.”

“Tell me about it.” Josh dropped down next to him, watching him closely with worried eyes. “So... you and Jenna.”

“She asked me,” Tyler started. “Well, kind of. Actually she just  _ assumed _ I was going to ask her. So I couldn’t tell her no. She’s my friend.”

“You can tell your friends no sometimes. Especially if it makes you uncomfortable.”

“I’m not uncomfortable,” he shot back in one big lie. Tyler was starting to get very irritated and all the stress he had felt lately was not helping the volcano that was about to explode in his mind. “She’s my friend. We’re going as friends. That’s all. I didn’t even want to go in the first place.”

“You mentioned that,” Josh said softly. Tyler wasn’t done. Now that he had started, things weren’t going to calm back down anytime soon.

“And you know what?” he popped up from the chair, his arms wildly moving around in building anger. “I don’t understand why you constantly stop talking to me all of a sudden and avoid me like wildfire. I didn’t do crap to you.”

“Tyler-”

“That’s the second time you’ve done that. I’m getting more and more frustrated Josh. I realize that we’re supposed to hate each other, and if you really feel that way, then so be it. I got better things to waste my time on.”

Josh’s face flashed with hurt, which turned to fury in seconds. “Okay then you fucking douchebag.” And with that, he walked out of the gym. Tyler collapsed into a chair again.

What a great day this was turning out to be.

\---

Pictures were at 6, dinner was at 7, and the dance started at 8. Everything was one big whirlwind and Tyler wished it would go by even faster. He wanted to apologize to Josh for everything he had said. He didn’t want to lose the person that he enjoyed spending time with.

Jenna had a one sided conversation with Tyler the entire time. “I hope they play good music. Ashley was in charge of finding a good DJ and I trust her music judgement but still. I’m so excited to see what the final product looks like! I know you did a good job. Oh Tyler, you look so handsome. Do you think I look pretty?”

“You look beautiful,” Tyler mumbled, not looking up from the chicken alfredo he had ordered.

“Thank you! You did so good on your flowers. They match my dress perfectly. Oh man, I can’t wait to see Debby’s dress. She’s going to look so beautiful.” Jenna blabbered on, and Tyler tried to stop feeling like he was going to puke.

The gym actually did look pretty nice. The entryways decorated by the class officers looked way better than Tyler had expected, and the lights fit the ambiance perfectly. Jenna squealed about every single thing.

And the music wasn’t even half bad. Tyler talked to people on his way in, short conversations that went pretty much like this:

“Hey [insert name here], you look nice!”

“Thanks Ty, it’s good to see you man! Can’t wait to see you play basketball again this year!”

“Thanks, I’ll talk to you later!” and then Tyler would continue on his way. At one point Jenna screamed so loudly he thought she had gotten stabbed or something. Apparently that was a thing girls did when they saw their friends.

He ventured into the catering room to grab a smoothie and catch a break from all the loud noise when familiar blue hair caught his eye.

Josh was leaning up against the back wall, dressed up in a black suit and bright blue tie that matched his hair almost perfectly. Plus, he was laughing about something with Jack and Gerard, so Tyler could see his dimples from a mile away.

His heart stopped. Josh had never told him he was going to be at homecoming.

Tyler fled immediately, throwing his untouched cup in the trash before he was pushing open the front doors and dropping to a bench. He gulped down breaths of air and tried to calm himself down. This was stupid. Every single thing was stupid and Tyler wanted everything to stop. He didn’t want to have a stupid crush on a stupid punk. He didn’t want Jenna to have a stupid crush on him. He didn’t want to be in student council and be in charge of stupid dances. He was tired of his stupid advanced placement classes and tired of stupid teachers.

“Tyler?” Jenna’s worried voice came from behind him and he stood up quickly, tripping on a crack in the sidewalk. Fortunately she managed to catch him before he could bust his head open on the cement. 

“Thanks.”

“Sure thing. Everything okay? They’re gonna announce court in a little bit.”

He forced a smile. “Yeah. I’m good. Let’s go back inside.” Jenna offered him her hand, and he let her lead him back inside.

\---

“And your homecoming king is...” everyone watched in suspense as the brunette opened the envelope, “Tyler Joseph!” 

The crowd went crazy as Tyler made his way up onto the stage. His face burned red as the girl placed a crown on his head. He could see all his stupid friends smirking at him, and Jenna’s big smile, mostly because she knew she was homecoming queen.

“Your homecoming queen is... Jenna Black!” More cheers erupted as she made her way next to tyler and looped her hand around his bicep. “Thank you everybody!” the microphone fizzled out and was replaced with the sound of a pounding bass. Jenna pulled Tyler down the stairs of the stage and into the crowd, the smile never leaving her face.

“This has been the best homecoming ever,” she whispered in his ear, her hand still tight around Tyler’s arm, and he nodded absentmindedly.

“Nice job dude!” Alex patted him roughly on the back.

“We all knew you were going to win.” That was Pete.

All his friends told him congratulations like winning some stupid popular vote was a great achievement or something. Tyler wanted out.

Jenna tugged on his arm and out of the crowd down an empty hallway. He was so happy to no longer be in a crowd that he didn’t even care why she had pulled him away from the group.

“I’m having a lot of fun,” she said, pulling him into a hug. Tyler hugged her back, unsure of what else to do. “Thank you for this.”

“We make a great team,” he replied back, wrapping his hand around one of the straps of her dress. Jenna giggled.

And then she was kissing him. Stunned, Tyler’s eyes widened and he pushed her off, instantly regretting it when her lip quivered and it was instant pain in her eyes. “Tyler?”

“Jenna, if I did anything to lead you on then I am so sorry. I don’t, I don’t like you that way, okay? I don’t. I love you in a best friend kind of way. You are an incredible person, and you’re beautiful and quirky, but I can’t. Not like this.” he felt terrible.

“I thought...” she raised a shaky palm to her forehead, tears starting to brim her eyelids. “You weren’t ever going to ask me to homecoming, were you? You just went with me to be nice?”

“You seemed so happy. I didn’t want to disappoint you.”

“So you let me kiss you instead? Just so you could turn me down?”

“I didn’t realize you wanted to do this,” his voice was rising rapidly with a hint of hysteria and hands flew up to tug on tufts of hair. “I’m oblivious Jenna, I didn’t realize. I thought we were going as friends.”

She scoffed, and wiped away some fallen tears. “Fuck you Tyler.” and just like that, she was running away.

“Jenna wait!” he shouted after her, but Jenna was already long gone. He thumped against the wall and yet out a frustrated groan. God, he really couldn’t do anything right. He never meant to lead her on, he was only trying to be nice, and that resulted in two of his favourite people hating him.

After splashing some cold water on his face, Tyler went back outside to sit on the bench in the front of the school. He could faintly hear the bass inside and people cheering and screaming. A couple stumbled out to their car still attached by the mouths. He sighed and dropped his head into his palms.

“You didn’t kiss her.” Tyler jerked his head up at Josh, who had sat down at the opposite end of the bench. “Why didn’t you kiss her?”

Tyler wanted to ask why Josh had been watching them. He wanted to apologize. Instead he shrugged. “She’s my friend. I don’t like her that way.”

“You sure made it seem like you like her that way.” he scooted closer.

“Well I don’t. She’s my friend.” Josh’s thigh was pressed against Tyler’s now. His eyes were bright under the streetlight.

“You didn’t kiss her,” he repeated, reaching out to trail his thumb across Tyler’s cheekbone. Tyler swallowed nervously when Josh’s entire hand cupped his cheek.

“She’s my friend.” Tyler closed his eyes the minute Josh’s lips brushed against his. Electricity ran through his body, through his veins, and everything felt  _ right. _ Every past relationship he had been in, there hadn’t been attraction, hadn’t been feeling or passion, but this kiss, Tyler felt everything all at once and he didn’t want it to ever end. He pushed into it, gripping the bottom of Josh’s suit jacket with grabby fingers and moaned with teeth sank down onto his bottom lip. He could feel himself growing hard so quickly his head was spinning.

Then it was over, and Josh pushed off the bench with his hands shoved in his pockets. “I’m your friend, right?” He started slowly, looking Tyler right in the eyes, “Why’d you kiss me?”

Tyler’s mouth was full of cotton. Josh clucked his tongue, nodded his head, and began walking towards the parking lot. There were several things Tyler could have done. He could have told Josh to come back. He could have admitted he had a big crush on him. He could have lied and said he hadn’t kissed him back, that it was all in Josh’s head.

Instead, he watched Josh get in Brendon’s car and drive away.

Tyler was such an idiot.


	6. "Stuff" is not Codename for Tyler

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> His thoughts won't stop fighting one another.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been so long since I've last posted anything. My motivation and willingness have been diminishing recently, and there's been a lot going on. But I'm hoping it's just a mood that passes.

With so much anxiety coursing through his veins, it wasn’t a surprise that he fell ill immediately following homecoming. Tyler stayed curled in bed with a box of kleenex at his side, and every few hours his mother would bring him a new, cold glass of Sprite and occasionally a small bowl of soup.

He couldn’t stop thinking of how _messed up_ he had made everything. Jenna hated his guts, Josh knew he was a big liar, and his friends wouldn’t stop pestering him about homecoming night. Tyler didn’t want to go to school and have to see Josh in the hallways. He especially didn’t want to sit next to Josh and have to deal with the awkwardness and all the damage he had already done.

His mother came and sat down on his bed towards noon on Tuesday; Tyler had his phone propped up against the side of his tissue box watching some cheesy Disney movie he had found on Netflix.

“How you feeling sweetheart?”

With a grunt Tyler forced himself to sit up against his propped pillow. “I’ve been better.”

She clucked her tongue and leaned forward to press the back of her hand to his forehead. “You’re still pretty warm. I bet you got sick from all that kissing you were doing at homecoming.”

“I didn’t do any kissing at homecoming,” Tyler muttered, thinking of Josh. “It’s probably school. Diseases spread like wildfire in school.”

“Yeah. I oughta take you and your siblings out and homeschool you. You wouldn’t get as sick then.”

“Don’t let the pathogens scare you,” he said teasingly, following up with a loud cough. His mother sighed.

“I’m going to get you more Sprite. Get some rest, won’t you?”

“Sure thing Mom,” promised Tyler as he snuggled back under the covers. “Hopefully I can go back to school tomorrow.”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” she waved a finger at him before disappearing out the door, and with that, Tyler was left alone. He closed his eyes and tried to calm his racing mind.

\---

He returned to school the following day halfway through 6th hour, and tried to ignore the eyes on him as he handed his pass to the teacher and sat down. His stomach wa s twisting with nervousness just thinking about what could happen in choir. Maybe he could ask his AP Calc teacher to stay into the next hour so he could catch up on what he missed. Tyler didn’t want to go into choir and have to deal with seeing Josh after what had happened just a few days ago. He didn’t want to look him in the eyes, didn’t want to interact with him, didn’t even want to see his blue hair or his dimples or his stupid doc martins. He didn’t want to deal with how _awkward_ he knew things were going to be.

Right before the bell rang, Tyler worked his way back to Neilson’s desk and cleared his throat. “Would it be okay if I stick around next hour to catch up on what I missed? I’m pretty confused with this stuff.”

He looked at Tyler with narrowed eyes, obviously debating. “What’s your next hour?”

“Choir. She’ll be okay with it, I promise.”

“Alright then. I’ll get you the notes and stuff, just pay attention and listen.”

Tyler sighed with relief. “Thank you so much.”

Crisis averted.

\---

He had to get creative the rest of the days, walking different ways to avoid Josh in the hall, staying late in some classes, leaving early in others. Tyler mostly stayed in the Stuco room helping Brown with anything he needed help with. Jenna still wasn’t talking to him, and he felt terrible about everything still, but he figured she would need more time than he did.

On Friday, Tyler felt pretty good about the way things were turning out. He had gotten pretty good at avoiding the punks, even if he was super behind in English. The weekend was ahead of him, and he actually had some decent weekend plans to look forward to.

His good mood went sour the minute he decided to go to the Stuco room and ended up being yanked into a faculty bathroom by a familiar blue-haired boy.

Tyler’s heart dropped into his stomach and he wanted to do nothing more than run far, far away from Josh across from him.

“You’re avoiding me,” he stated, leaning against the door. Tyler dropped down onto the closed toilet lid and refused to make eye contact.

“I’m not. Just been sick.”

“You haven’t been in English all week. I know you’ve been here too. O’Hara said you were in the Stuco room.”

“So what if I have? We’re busy.”

“With what? Homecoming is over.” Shoot. Tyler knew Josh was catching on, but he continued his story because he didn’t want to talk about _it._

“There’s always stuff to do. Spirit week stuff. There’s more football games too. You know. That kind of stuff.”

A sigh. Josh crouched down in front of him. “Tyler, we really need to talk about what happened at homecoming.”

“No we don’t,” he mumbled.

“Yeah, we do. You kissed me.”

Tyler finally looked up and immediately regretted it. He looked very _attractive_ today, and Tyler found himself wondering what Josh had looked like on the days he had avidly been avoiding him. “You kissed me first.”

“Because I was suspicious. We need to get some things straight, okay? You can't keep running away from me.”

Tyler wanted to tell him he could very well run away, and was probably much faster, but only sighed instead because Josh was probably right. So he waved him to continue and went back to focusing really hard on some weird spot on one of the ground tiles.

“Okay look. Tyler, I like you a lot. You’re smart, you’re funny, you’re talented... you’re everything I’m not. And I really like spending time with you. Which is kinda crazy when you think about it, because we’re two totally different people, and we don’t really know each other that well, but every second with you is something... _incredible._ So I really just wanna know why you lied to me.”

“I didn’t mean too. I swear. I just panicked.” he blinked a few times, trying to push back down his urge to cry. Josh made him feel all kinds of things he wasn’t use to feeling, but most specifically he felt this warm, burning in the back of his throat just knowing that Josh _liked him back._ “I’m so confused with, with who I am as a person. My whole life I was sorta kinda expected to be perfect. I was the good kid. That’s just who everyone sees me I guess, and a big part of that was me eventually marrying a perfect girl and having a perfect family. But that’s just the thing Josh, I’ve never, well, been attracted to girls. I just assumed it was because I hadn’t found the right one yet, but I know now, that’s not the case. I’ve always seen you in the hallways, always felt this weird thing in my gut, but the minute you started talking to me, all that banter we had the first couple of days, I finally felt attraction. And that’s why I panicked that night on the roof. I thought that if I told you I was... you know, you’d automatically know I had a huge crush on you.”

Josh was silent. Tyler’s face was red and his legs were starting to fall asleep from his position on the toilet seat.

“So... you’re gay.”

“Uhm. Yes.”

Josh scoffed, and suddenly he was in full blown laughter, leaning against the door to hold himself up. Tyler watched him closely, his face turning more red by the second. Why was that funny? Why was any of this funny?

_This is his revenge,_ he thought, his eyebrows raising in the process, _Because of what I did._

“I can’t believe this.” finally finished, Josh sniffed, took a couple deep breaths, and went to crouch back down in front of Tyler, softly laying his hand on Tyler’s knee. “Think about how crazy this is. The stereotypical jock dating the loser punk. We’re Patrick and Brad in _Perks of Being a Wallflower,_ except hopefully with a happier ending. And you’re much nicer than Brad.”

“This whole thing is crazy. If my family were to find out I like guys, I don’t even want to know what would happen. I have to sit through church every Sunday and feel this, this _guilt_ rolling over me. I don’t want to be feeling guilty about this but it’s a little hard to do that when I don’t even know who I am.”

“Tyler, it’s okay.” Josh’s expression fell serious as he moved to slot his fingers in between the empty spaces of the frantic boy. “I understand all of that. And although I’ve had a little more time to figure out who I am, I’ve been through of that. I was just _kicked out of my house_ because of who I am. I just don’t understand why you didn’t trust me with all of this when you knew what happened to me.”

“Because I’m terrified!” Tyler shot up so fast Josh stumbled backwards, surprised at the jock’s outburst. “I’m so scared of someone finding out that I’m gay and I don’t want people to call me things or my parents to kick me out or me to lose my scholarship or-”

“You aren’t going to lose anything man! It’s okay that you’re this way, nobody is going to get upset with you.”

“You don’t know that. Look at me Josh. I’m a jock. I play basketball, I’m in student council, I sing in choir, I’m not someone that people look at and think gay. I’m not supposed to be that way.”

“Then you don’t tell anyone. Nobody is forcing you to come out to the entire world. I’m just saying that I’m here if you need someone to talk to. I know we’ve been having some problems but Tyler I don’t want to let you go. I don’t want you to figure this stuff out on your own.” This time Josh sighed, pushing his foot into the floor. “Look. I think we have the beginning of a good friendship. And I don’t want to lose you.”

“I don’t want to lose you either,” Tyler admitted. He awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck until he could feel it tingling. “I like you a lot.”

“I like you too.” his voice was soft and rich and reminded Tyler about just one of the many things he liked about Josh. “I like you a lot, a lot.” he took a few steps closer until Tyler’s back thumped against the wall and his skin burned with electricity when Josh cupped his cheek. “Can I kiss you?”

“Uh-huh.” it was nothing more than a whisper, but he let himself melt into the back wall as Josh’s soft lips met his. Everything all at once, all the pain and stress and anxiety seemed to just _melt away_ as gentle fingers brushed against his jaw, tangled in his hair slid down his body and underneath his shirt and all Tyler did was let it happen because he hadn’t felt something that had so much meaning behind it. He felt on top of the world.

Josh thumbed at the skin on Tyler’s hip and hummed a little as he pushed under jeans and the waistband of boxers, gingerly pressing four crescent shaped nail marks into Tyler’s ass.

Tyler, of course, moaned a little at the touch and opened his mouth to deepen the kiss, which Josh appreciated greatly. The fact that the last thing on Tyler’s mind was _school,_ because _holy hell they were making out in school,_ reminded him just how deep he was.

And then the door opened.

Tyler shoved Josh off of him so quickly the punk landed on his butt and they both locked eyes with an unknown teacher.

“You _didn’t lock the door?_ ” Tyler muttered through his fake smile.

Josh pushed himself of the ground and dusted off his pants, putting on a fake smile of his own. “Hello there sir. Uhm, we needed a private place to chat.”

“You need a key to get into this room.”

“Right, and I have a key. Green let me use his.” Josh gestured to the bulge in his pants and Tyler ducked his face. That was definitely not a key. Even if the key was with a bunch of other things in his pocket, there was _no way_ that was anything but a boner.

The teacher narrowed his eyes. “Boys, if you were doing anything inappropriate-”

“We weren’t sir, I promise. Just having a private conversation.”

“Get out of here. Key or not, I don’t want to see you guys in here again.” the unnamed teacher pointed a finger out of the restroom and Tyler darted out quickly, ducking his head in the process. He couldn’t believe that had happened. They had been so close to being outed, he had been impulsive and immature and they could never do that again.

Oh but he wanted to, _god_ did he want to. He wasn’t the only one that had grown hard from that kiss.

“You okay?” Josh asked in a whisper, his hands deep in his pockets. Tyler shrugged.

“We could have been caught right then and there and I don’t even want to think about what could have happened. We can’t do that again, not here, not ever-”

“Not ever?” he stopped Tyler from walking, one pale hand latching around his wrist. “Are you serious?”

“Of course I’m not!” Tyler groaned, shaking out of Josh’s grip to hide his face behind his hands. “I can’t talk about this right now man. I have to think about what we just did. Frick, we just kissed! We made out!”

“Yes...?” through the cracks in his fingers he could see Josh’s confused expression. “What’s wrong?”

“In school! And you didn’t lock the door!” With another groan, Tyler continued stomping down the hallway. He needed to get away from Josh, far far _far_ away.

“I didn’t lock the door cause obviously that wasn’t planned. Ty, just take a deep breath. You’re overreacting here.”

“I’m overreacting! Great. Just great.” Josh reached for him again, and Tyler slumped against the wall, feeling just a little bit of tranquility rush over him. “I can’t do this right now Josh, I really can’t.”

“Okay,” he spoke calmly, “Then I’m going to give you my phone number, and we can talk about it later, okay? Can we do that?”

Tyler tried to swallow the lump in his throat and nodded. “Yeah. Okay.”

“Good.” Josh let go, fishing out a little scrap of paper out of his pocket. He handed it to Tyler carefully and cleared his throat. “If it means anything, I thought it was really nice.” And with that, Tyler watched him disappear up the stairwell.

“Me too,” he whispered, glancing down at the folded paper Josh had prepared with his number on already. He sort of wondered how long Josh had had that in his pocket, ready to give it to someone (or him) on demand.

Tyler knew he needed to clear his head and try to figure out what the heck had happened, but all he could think of was the next time he was going to get to kiss that stupid punk.

He let out a whoosh of breath, ran a hand through his hair, and walked to the Stuco room.

\---

The minute he got home from school, Tyler flopped down face first on his bed and refused to move. He knew in a few minutes his parents were going to make him go shoot his stupid free throws, but he couldn’t do it, not today. He didn’t even want to deal with the mountain of homework he had to do from classes he had missed and homework given today. Good thing it was Friday. He’d deal with his homework later.

Tyler was gay. He knew he was gay and he knew he had a massive crush on a stupid punk that liked him back and they had made out in a school bathroom and his veins had been fueled with so much adrenaline Tyler didn’t even care if they had gotten caught. It was a feeling he had _never_ felt before, and that was incredibly dangerous. He had to take things slow with Josh or he knew he was going to turn into someone he didn’t know.

But Tyler was weak, and Josh was a drug, and he knew it was only a matter of time before he got addicted.

He groaned.

There were three loud knocks at his door. “Tyler, go shoot your hoops!”

He groaned again. “Dad, can I not today? I still feel awful.”

“You have to do twice as many tomorrow if you don’t do it tonight.” that caught Tyler’s attention and he pushed himself off the bed to throw open his door.

“You expect me to throw a thousand baskets in one day?”

“I expect you to train hard. You got out of club basketball this year, and school basketball is going to be here before you know it. You need to prove you deserve to be on a D1 team, understand?”

A sigh. “Yeah. I got it.”

“Your mom and I don’t do this to make you suffer, okay kid? We just want you to be successful. You wanna win championships, don’t you?”

“Well yeah, but-”

“Then no buts. Practice makes perfect Tyler, you know that. So go shoot your hoops or you aren’t eating dinner.”

“Dad! I can’t do that today, I had-”

“Now.” his father growled, and Tyler’s mouth snapped shut. With a death glare, Tyler shoved past his dad and marched outside, slamming the door behind him. Then he dropped to the cement and stared at the sky, trying to hold back his tears. He refused to cry over something so stupid. He had to shoot his free throws every single day and today was no exception. This however, took the cake. After one terrible week this was what finally broke him.

And so Tyler let himself cry, kicking that stupid basketball across the lawn with everything he had. Then he pulled out his phone and messily texted Josh.

 

Tyjo (3:01 pm) 

 

_Please come save me_

 

Joshua (3:01 pm) 

 

_Tyler?_

 

Tyler (3:02 pm) 

 

_Yeah. please. I need you_

 

Joshua (3:03 pm) 

 

_Omw_

 

He felt absolutely pathetic telling Josh that he needed him, but it wasn’t like Tyler could go to any of his friends. What was he supposed to say? “Hey, so I made out with a guy today... and I finally admitted to myself that I was gay. Plus, my best friends hate me, my parents are forcing me to play basketball and I really hate life at the moment.”

He needed someone to hug him and tell him it was going to be alright. He needed to get far away from his house, and for once he wasn’t even worried about what his parents were going to say. So Tyler waited in the backyard against the back wall of the house with his knees hiked to his chest, trying to take deep breaths and calm himself down. Ridiculous. All of this was stupid and ridiculous.

Josh surprisingly got there very quickly and found his way to Tyler’s side, his face full of worry. “Ty? What’s wrong?”

“I don’t want to be here,” he whispered, feeling some relief at Josh’s calloused fingers on his wrists. “Let’s go anywhere but here.”

“What about your parents?”

“I don’t care, jus’ get me out of here.”

“Okay, let’s go back to Brendon’s.” he helped Tyler up and slung an arm around his shoulders, being very patient as Josh led him to his motorcycle down the street. This time, he gave Tyler the helmet. “Put that on. I need to get another one.”

With a nod, he slid it on, feeling another burst of adrenaline the minute he wrapped his arms around Josh’s waist. He was sneaking out, unknowingly to his parents. What if they looked outside and realized he wasn’t there?

“Hey,” Josh turned around, that worried look still on his face, “you sure you wanna do this? I don’t want you to get in trouble or anything.”

“Go,” Tyler mumbled, pointing with a finger, and he meant it. Forget what his parents wanted, he could care less. (Sort of.)

“Alright then. Hold on.” Tyler’s grip tightened, and Josh drove on.

\---

“Brendon, is that you?” a voice called from the kitchen the second Josh pulled Tyler into the Urie household.

“It’s me Mrs. Urie, I have a friend over to study for our English test,” Josh replied, tugging Tyler up the stairs by his hand. They walked to the bedroom at the back of the hall where he unlocked the door and gently nudged the jock in. Tyler sat down on the edge of the bed and toed off his shoes, refusing to look up as Josh sat down next to him. “Hey. You okay?”

“Not really,” Tyler mumbled. “It’s been a bad week.”

“Wanna talk about it?”

One glance at Josh was all he needed to suddenly feel the urge to cry all over again. Never had someone looked at him with such kindness in their eyes. All his friends laughed if he even showed signs of weakness, and Dallon, although his best friend, was not someone he could cry in front of. Maybe he couldn’t talk about it. Maybe Josh was still upset with him, and this was all a dream or an act or whatever else.

“Ty?” repeated Josh, reaching out for his knee, when Tyler himself went against everything he knew and kissed him as hard as he could. Josh tumbled backwards onto his bed out of surprise, his arms combatting Tyler’s grabby fingers to push him away.

In defeat, Tyler pulled off immediately, feeling even worse than he had before. The tears were almost impossible to stop now. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“Nothing’s wrong with you, I was just surprised is all.” Josh shook his head before planting a soft kiss to Tyler’s cheek. “Please tell me what’s wrong. I hate to see you like this.”

“I don’t know who I am,” he whispered, sniffing and wiping his nose with the back of his hand. “And that’s terrifying to me. Plus Jenna hates me because I didn’t kiss her back, and Dallon refuses to talk to me, and you, you...I don’t know. I’m worried is all.”

“You have every right to be worried Ty, but it’s going to be okay. Listen, things with Jenna, they’ll work out. She just needs time. Everyone who gets rejected needs time. Things are going to be okay.”

He sniffed, picked a loose thread off his shirt, and took a deep breath. “You promise?”

“Of course I do. I want to make whatever we have work.”

“Me too.”

“Okay. Then we make it work.” Josh flopped backwards, the bed creaking underneath the sudden weight. Tyler settled down next to him nervously. Everything was finally starting to come to him all at once; he had left the house without telling his parents, his friendships were on the fritz and he was _dating a guy._ “Promise me you won’t feel guilty about being gay.”

“I can’t promise that. But I’ll try.”

“Admitting it is the first step. So you’re doing pretty good so far.”

“That’s good then.”

“Yeah.” Josh went quiet after that, the only sound the slight hum of the ceiling fan every time it completed a turn. After a few minutes, Tyler felt fingers brush over his palm before they closed over the top of his hand.

“Basketball ever stress you out?” he whispered. Tyler scoffed.

“Of course.”

“Why do you play it then?”

“Cause I like it. I like the way I feel when I play it. And it’s going to get me to a good future.”

“Do sports actually matter after high school?”

“Well... I suppose not. But I want to go professional. I want to be in the NBA someday.”

“That’s a pretty big dream.”

“So I’ve been told.” he blinked a few times, smiling when Josh squeezed his hand. “There’s not much else I like to do though. Thinking about my future is really freaky sometimes. Like, we have to do adult things in a year’s time. I don’t know.”

“I know what you mean. So live in the now.”

“That’s hard to do.”

With a chuckle, Josh rolled over to face Tyler. “For you it is. I never think about my future.”

“Must be nice, huh?” that smile was still plastered across his face, growing even bigger when Josh untangled their hands and pressed a finger to Tyler’s lips.

“Soft,” he commented, smile turning more into a smirk as magenta began to blossom across Tyler’s face. “You are pretty much the most attractive person I’ve ever seen.”

He rolled his eyes and nudged Josh’s finger away. “You’re just saying that.”

“Of course I’m not. You’re cute.”

“You’re cheesy. What happened to that jerk punk kid?”

“I’m still him. Just showing you my softer side.” he scooted closer, josling the mattress underneath them. Uh oh. Sweaty palms, racing heartbeat, electricity buzzing at his fingertips, all tall tell signs of symptoms he always got around this stupid punk.

And then, lips were on his, soft and sweet, and Josh’s breath tasted like strawberries and Tyler never wanted it to end. If every time they kissed it was going to be like this, well Tyler was going to start forgetting how to breathe.

They continued to make out for a good hour and a half, up until there was a loud pounding on the door that jolted the two apart. After a shared look of concern, Josh hoisted himself off his bed and shuffled to the door, glancing back at Tyler once more before turning the knob.

“Josh, I’m going to fucking kill you!” Brendon barged in with his face twisted in anger, which slowly faded away when he noticed Tyler sprawled across the bed. “What the fuck...?”

“Tyler was over for an English project,” Josh replied, grabbing Brendon’s shoulder tightly to steer him out of the room. Brendon tugged away and scoffed.

“Think you forgot I’m in your English class asshole. We don’t have an English project.” with narrowed eyes, he folded his arms across his chest. “Were you guys about to fu-”

“No!” Josh yelled, shoved Brendon back towards the door. “We were just hanging out. Get your mind out of the gutter.”

“Alright then. And fuck you for not putting the toilet seat down. I almost died.”

Josh burst into laughter, causing Brendon to scowl. “That’s what you’re mad about?”

“Yes! Fuck you!”

“Get out. I was doing stuff.”

“Is ‘stuff’ codename for Tyler?” Brendon’s smirk was bigger than any smirk Tyler had even seen, even through his fingers hiding his red face.

“Fuck you Brendon,” Josh muttered, shoving his friend out of the room and locking the door. He let his back thump against it and groaned audibly. “Sorry Ty.”

Tyler scooted to the end of the bed and shrugged. “You monster. He could have drowned in that toilet.”

With a roll of his eyes, Josh moved across the room in two steps and slid his hand around the back of Tyler’s neck, kissing him once more. Tyler hummed, letting Josh mold him, press his back into the bed and straddle him with everything he had.

“Thank you for distracting me,” Tyler murmured after a couple minutes.

“Anytime,” Josh replied, sliding a hand back under Tyler’s shirt. This was the best feeling in the world, he decided. Not having to think about his parents or his future or basketball. Letting someone lead him through something truly was the best feeling in the world. Nothing else mattered now, not even the incoming texts from his angry parents.


	7. Thinking, Times Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being grounded forces Tyler into an existential crisis.

Tyler got grounded.

He tried to explain to his parents that he went to take a walk, but his father assumed he had done it “out of spite” and assured him he was going to make up for it over the weekend. His phone and car keys were taken away, and true to his word, Tyler was forced to shoot free throw after free throw until his hands hurt from gripping the ball and his feet hurt from standing for so long. It was almost 7 o’clock at night and Tyler hadn’t eaten anything all day. He could feel where his skin was sunburnt and grimaced when he rolled his shoulders back. Just a hundred more throws and he could go inside.

The back door slid open and his father came out, clearing his throat in the process. Tyler ignored him, tossing the ball and groaning when it bounced off the rim and rolled into the lawn.

“Tyler,” His father’s voice was stern and gentle, which was quite a surprise from the anger he had shown the previous night and most of the day. “Can we talk?”

He watched his dad pick the ball up and line up his shot, the ball falling through the net gracefully. Tyler huffed.

“What’s going on with you lately?” he seemed honestly worried, reaching out a hand to rest it on his son’s shoulder. Tyler used all he had to not shove his father away. “You’re acting different.”

“No I’m not. I’m just distracted. There’s a lot going on at school.”

“Even so. All of this is so unlike you. Talking back, leaving without telling anyone, ignoring your chores and other responsibilities... is there something you need to tell me?”

He sighed. “No dad, I’m fine. There’s just a lot going on right now. Once things settle out I’ll be fine.”

“That’s not an excuse to be disrespectful. You know what you are expected to do every day and you can’t up and decide you aren’t going to do it. The season is coming up in just a few weeks Tyler, and you need to be prepared. Do you understand that?”

“Yes,” he muttered.

“Good. Your mother and I don’t like to punish you, but if you keep acting this way then we are going to have to. You’re a good kid Tyler, and we are very proud of everything you’ve accomplished. I love you a lot. Just tone down the attitude, got it?”

“Yes,” he repeated. His father smiled, and pulled Tyler into half hug. 

“Now let's play a quick game and I’ll take you to go get some food. Sound good?”

“Only if it’s Cane's.” Tyler flashed a small smile to which his dad raised an eyebrow.

“Deal.” they shook hands before his father tossed him the ball. “On your feet kid.”

\---

On Monday Tyler went into the Stuco room early, hoping to catch Jenna. He really wanted to make things right.

The minute Jenna saw him, she scowled and turned on her heel, her long blonde hair flipping over her shoulder.

“Jenna please wait.” he chased after her, sliding over a table and stumbling over a chair just to get across the room. “Can we please talk?”

“Definitely not.”

“Jenna I can’t keep going through my days with you being mad at me. Please.”

She looked at him with fury and pain in her eyes before giving a sigh of defeat. “Okay. You have five minutes.”

“Look. I love you to death Jenna. You’re my best friend and my second half. You are incredible and amazing and probably one of the best people I’ve ever been. Anyone would be so lucky to have you as their girlfriend, but I value our friendship so much and I don’t want to lose what we have. If I ever made it seem like I liked you romantically at all, I am so sorry. I never meant to come on or project anything like that. You are very beautiful Jenna, but you need to find someone better than me.”

“Don’t say that.” her voice was shaky and barely over a whisper. “You’re perfect Tyler-”

“I’m not perfect. I make all kinds of mistakes and I love you as a friend. So I’m sorry for any false signs I gave you.”

“We would have been perfect together, the power couple, the most popular people in school-”

“We can’t build a relationship off of that. You’re my best friend Jenna, you know that. We’re similar in so many ways and I wouldn’t want any other person to be my partner. And please don’t think it’s because I think you aren’t good enough, because you are. But you aren’t for me.”

She sniffed and reached for a kleenex off of Brown’s desk, using it to dab at mascara starting to run down her cheeks. “I understand. I’m going to need time.”

“Of course. I know this kind of stuff is very hard to deal with. Trust me, I know. But please don’t let this ruin our friendship.” he rested a clammy palm on her shoulder, his heart beating a mile a minute. “We’ll find our man one day.”

That got Jenna to flip around. “Our man? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I just mean we’re, you’re, gonna find someone one day, that’s all I meant-”

“Are you  _ gay  _ Tyler?”

“No!” He blinked frantically, praying silently that she couldn’t notice how sweaty he was. “That’s not what I was saying at all Jenna, I was being hypothetical-”

“Oh my god.” tears were once again brimming at her eyelids. “It makes sense now why you wouldn’t want to date me. Who’s the lucky guy, huh?”

“Jenna stop it. You’re being ridiculous.”

“Yeah? Well go suck a dick or something.” With a scoff, she shoved past him and out the door, and this time Tyler didn’t bother to chase after her.

\---

“Can you hang out after school today?” Josh whispered, leaning his whole body into it the minute Tyler sat down in his seat and began pulling out his English folder.

“No. I’m grounded.”

“Oh. There’s a way around that though, right?”

“No, there’s not. I disobeyed so now I’m paying for it.” After his conversation with Jenna, Tyler was feeling like absolute crap and really didn’t want to talk to the person who was playing a role in the mess his life had become. “Besides, I feel like we should take some time to think about what we’re getting into.”

“That’s what I’ve been saying Tyler.”

“I just feel like we’re taking things too fast, I hardly know you for one, which is not enough for us to constantly be making out-”

“I agree-”

“And although it’s very nice, I just feel like we should go out on a proper date before we start doing stuff.”

“Alright then. Once you’re no longer grounded I’ll take you on a date. Halloween night Jack’s having a party. You in?”

Tyler sighed. “Josh...”

“Tyler.” he raised an eyebrow, one of his famous cocky smirks rising to his lips. 

“Boys, stop talking.” O’Hara shot them both a look, to which Tyler sneered out of habit and scooted his chair over a little bit. Josh huffed himself and crossed his arms.

And that was the end of that.

\---

The first thing Alex said at lunch was, “Dude, what the hell did you do to make Jenna so pissed at you?” and Tyler sighed.

“I’ve told you guys a million times, I don’t like her that way. And for some reason she thought I did and tried to kiss me.”

“Well did you kiss her back?” 

“Of course not. She’s my friend.” the entire table let out a collective groan, minus Dallon of course, who wasn’t even there to groan in the first place. Tyler slumped down in his seat. Of course, the first time he shared what really went down at homecoming he would be judged for it.

“God Tyler, I have no clue what to do with you anymore.”

“You guys can’t force me to date someone I don’t have feelings for.”

“It’s not about having feelings for them dude, it’s about losing your virginity. You can drop them after that.” Spencer grinned, obviously satisfied with his poor advice. Tyler scoffed. His friends were such douchebags.

“Hey, there’s rumors of a party going down floating around school. Wanna come with us?” Pete tried to change the subject, which Tyler was very thankful for. Patrick nodded his head and added his own input.

“Heard the punks are hosting it.”

“Gives us plenty of material to show those fuckers we’re the ones who rule the school.” Alex elbowed Tyler, who scowled in response. “Gives you the chance to finally get some.”

“How’s the soccer season?” he tried to change the subject again, but Alex just wasn’t having it.

“Don’t change the subject.”

“It’s good, thanks for asking,” Pete called from the other side of the table, obviously amused by the event unfurling in front of him.

“Tyler, we have got to get you a girlfriend. I’ll set you up with this girl I know.” Alex began pulling out his phone and Tyler grabbed his wrist to stop him.

“Alex, seriously. Basketball is coming up and I really need to focus. Besides,” he shrugged nonchalantly, “I’m dating someone.” The table filled with whistles after that, but Alex didn’t seem to believe it. He scoffed and leaned back against his chair.

“Oh yeah? What’s her name?”

“J-” he cleared his throat and picked the first name that came to his mind. “Jesse. She uhm, doesn’t go here.”

“You are so full of shit Tyler.”

With a sigh, he admitted defeat. He never had been very good at lying. “Yeah. I am. Just let me figure things out of my own, okay?”

A smirk rose to Alex’s face. “I’m going to make sure you get laid before the end of the year, just you wait.”

Tyler buried his head in his arms.

\---

The rest of the week dragged on slowly with Tyler still being grounded. Getting to school was proven to be difficult since he no longer had access to a car or his phone. The bus was awful, full of annoying freshman and the strange kids that always sat in the back and shouted obscene things at each other. He felt ready to scream.

Plus, basketball tryouts were coming up, and his parents were well aware, making him do almost twice as many free throws (his father said it wasn’t punishment, but it sure felt like it) every single day when he got home.

On Wednesday, there was a knock at Tyler’s window as he was changing clothes for school. He was a little surprised to see Josh smiling at him from the other end as he pushed the window up enough to hear him.

“Hey, need a ride?”

“What are you doing here?” in bewilderment, Tyler whipped his head around to the chaos going on with the rest of his siblings. When nobody seemed to be close, he turned back around. “You shouldn’t be here!”

“Chillax dude, I parked down the street. Come on, Brendon’s waiting for us.”

“Wait, how’d you know-”

“You told me you were grounded, you haven’t been answering your phone, and I saw you walk to the bus when you left choir the past two days. The bus sucks, we both know that. Now up and at em.”

Tyler’s entire body sighed with relief as he nodded his head and shut the window, straightening his shirt collar as he tossed his book bag lazily over his shoulders. “Mom, Dad, I’m leaving!”

“With who?” Zack stopped him in the kitchen when Tyler detoured to grab a granola bar for later. “Mom says you can’t ride with me since you’re grounded and the bus doesn’t come for another 20 minutes.”

“Dallon’s taking me,” he lied, shoving past his brother and out the front door. Josh was waiting patiently across the street with a small smile still plastered across his perfect face.

“Hey there Bolton. You gonna let me hold your hand, or is that taking things too fast?”

Tyler scowled, but still allowed Josh to entangle their fingers between them. “Shut up. You know for a fact I wanna take things fast but we can’t. Gotta be normal and stuff so I freak out a lot less.”

“Hey, you’re doing a good job. Man, I can’t wait for you to be ungrounded. This is the worst thing in the world.”

“Agreed,” mumbled Tyler. Josh fumbled with the car keys as they approached the camry, the car making a small  _ beep beep _ as it unlocked. Tyler could see Brendon texting furiously in the back seat.

“Hey fuckface!” Josh called cheerily when they both had climbed into the car. He strung his seatbelt across his chest, shooting Brendon a look through the rearview mirror. “Who you texting?”

“No one,” Brendon replied back without bothering to look up. He also quietly muttered “Dick,” under his breath as Josh barrelled down the street and out of the neighbourhood.

“Brendon’s been a real treat lately,” Josh explained to Tyler like he wasn’t sitting in the back seat. 

“Fuck you Josh, you think I like to hear about how perfect Tyler is all the time?” he scoffed, and Tyler’s face turned bright red. Did Josh really talk about him like that?

“I do not! Quit making shit up.” Tyler was surprised to see that Josh’s face was just as red. “Sides, at least you know who I’m talking to. Who is this mysterious person you’re  _ always _ talking to?”

“Why do you assume it’s one person? I have multiple friends.”

Josh let out a loud bark. “Ha! Name one besides me.”

“You aren’t my friend anymore you asshole.” Brendon was grinning himself now as well, leaning forward between the two seats. “Tyler, will you be my new best friend?”

“Sure.”

Josh gasped. “Et tu, Brute?”

“Wait, you actually read  _ Julius Caesar? _ ” Brendon went from shocked to annoyed when Josh laughed at him again.

“Of course not. That play sucked. Everyone knows Brutus betrayed Caesar. He’s pretty much the reason Caesar got stabbed.”

“I oughta stab you.”

“You love me.”

Brendon huffed, but that wide grin never left his face. Josh turned the radio on after that, and the three of them sang to pop songs at the top of their lungs. Tyler realized that he had really misjudged just who these so called “punks” really were.

\---

In English, Josh had told Tyler to meet him behind the stairs during his lunch period. Tyler had been curious since Josh didn’t have the same lunch as him.

But it all made sense the minute Josh pulled him into the restroom and into the last stall. He pressed Tyler against the wall and leaned forward, one of his arms resting on his sternum. Josh recognized the look the jock gave him and immediately began arguing. “Look, I know what you said.”

“We can’t keep doing this dude.”

“I know.” Josh sighed. “But I can’t help it. You’re just so kissable.”

“You definitely aren’t kissing me after what happened last time.”

“I locked the door this time.” he gestured to the locked stall door with a smirk on his face. “Come on, we’re going on a date soon once you get ungrounded. Just once?”

“This is going to turn into something a thousand times more than ‘just a kiss.’” Tyler nudged Josh off of him and turned away. “Josh, I can’t handle myself around you. I’ve already told you-”

“I know. And I’m sorry. I don’t want to push you or anything, I just get greedy. You’re unlike anyone I’ve ever met, you know that?”

“And you know I feel the same way, but we gotta take it slow. Just until I can figure out what I’m doing with myself.”

“Okay. Yeah. I get it.” with a small smile, Josh unlocked the door and pushed out, waiting for Tyler to follow him. “Halloween night then.”

“Yep,” Tyler replied, popping the p. “Halloween night.”

“Cool. I’ll uh, see you in choir.” He stood awkwardly for a few seconds before darting out of the restroom. The second he was gone, Tyler let out a large breath of air and leaned against the sink to splash some water in his face. All he needed was some time, but  _ god _ was it hard trying to control his urge to constantly want to make out with that stupid, adorable punk. 

Feeling these,  _ real _ feelings, really actually kind of sucked.

\---

Josh gave Tyler a ride home, and the two were quiet for the first minute and a half. Tyler was watching the time, counting the seconds slowly under his breath.

“You know,” he broke the silence, “Brendon’s been... weird.”

“Nah,” Josh shrugged, “he’s usually weird.”

“Where is he now?”

“Went home with someone else. He’s been all over the place lately. I’ve been having to cover for his ass a lot lately. His parents are getting suspicious.”

“He hasn’t told you where he’s going?”

“Nope. It’s not like it’s any of my business. He did so much for me, the least I can do is give him some privacy. If he wants to tell me, he will.”

Tyler nodded. “Yeah, that’s true.”

“How are things with Dallon?”

“Haven’t talked to him in a while. He’s just as distant.”

“Hmmm. You don’t think...” Josh looked at him for a split second before they both burst into laughter.

“Dallon is most likely stressed with college and stuff. I know he’s looking into colleges out west, far away from home and stuff. So... I don’t blame him.”

Josh nudged him. “He’s your best friend man. You gotta talk to him. You said you wanted to sort yourself out, so this is something you’ve got to get done. Right?”

He sighed. “Yeah, you’re right.”

“I usually am. Jus’ sayin’.” Josh smiled a toothy grin and ducked out of Tyler’s playful punch. “Halloween can’t come faster.”

“Yeah,” Tyler mumbled, leaning on his elbow to look out the window. “It can’t.”

\---

Dallon ignored the first three of Tyler’s phone calls. In fact, Tyler was just about ready to give everything up. He could only push so many relationships.

But finally, at 8:02 pm, Dallon called Tyler, and he tripped over his own socked feet trying to answer it.

“Hello?” he replied, out of breath.

“Uhm, hey.” Dallon sighed. “Tyler, I’m so-”

“Sorry,” Tyler interrupted him. “I mean, me too. I’m sorry for being such a jerk and being all over the place. I’ve just been stressed lately. And I know that’s a real crappy excuse-”

“No, it’s okay. I’ve been the same way for the same reasons. It’s all the senior year stuff. That’s getting to us, right? I mean, we have to decide where we’re going, and apply for scholarships and all that jazz... it’s crazy, all of it.”

“Right. There’s a lot going on, for the both of us.”

“And I’m sorry for being distant and avoiding you. I really do love you dude, you’re my best friend.”

“I love you too man.” Tyler rubbed at his eyes with the heel of his hand. “Look, is there a day we could get together maybe?”

“This Saturday maybe? I got this church thing to attend early in the morning but afterwards I’m free. We could shoot hoops and get ready for basketball tryouts. You aren’t doing the conditioning practices, are you?”

“Nah, my dad is making me do so much stuff at home that it’s completely pointless. Saturday sounds good. I am grounded though, so I’ll have to tell them we’re studying.”

Dallon laughed. “Sounds good dude. It’ll really be nice to see you again. Hey, I’ll actually come to lunch too.”

Tyler found himself smiling. This was so much better than he thought it would be. “Yeah, that sounds good.”

“Awesome. See you tomorrow Tyler.” and with that, Dallon clicked off. Tyler flopped down on his bed and sighed again. There were only a few more things he needed to get done and maybe, just  _ maybe,  _ he would finally start feeling like himself again.

His phone buzzed. Tyler reached for it, assuming it was Dallon texting him further details. Unfortunately, that was not the case.

 

Joshua (8:10 pm)

 

_ I’m thinking about you dude, and I think it might be pretty bad that I can’t get you out of my mind. _

 

Tyler sighed, shoved his phone under his pillow, and resisted his urge to scream.  _ Everything is okay. I am okay. He is okay. I can’t get him out of my mind and that is okay. _

He knew he was a jerk for not replying, but Tyler needed to clear his head, so he closed his eyes and forced himself to fall asleep.


	8. Rule #72: Stay With Your Companion at All Times

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tyler and Josh go to a Halloween Party.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've turned into a broadway junkie
> 
> By the way, Happy Thanksgiving to those that celebrate! I'm thankful for a place of such optimism and support. :) <3

Halloween came much sooner than expected, the days leading up to it a whirlwind of craziness. Tyler spent all his time on homework and basketball, almost never having time for anything else. With the season coming up, Tyler really had no time to do anything else. That’s all his parents wanted him to do: practice, practice, practice. He even started avoiding his friends during lunch and ate in the Stuco room instead.

Jenna, however, did apologize, which made Tyler feel a  _ thousand _ times better.

She had pulled him to the side of the hallway before Stuco with tears already streaming down her face. “I’m so sorry Tyler, I was a jerk, I was such a jerk-”

“Jenna, it’s okay!” he wrapped his arms around her and squeezed tightly. He had been imagining all kinds of scenarios for this moment over the course of several weeks, and Tyler thanked God it was going okay. “I forgive you.”

“I was pissed because you rejected me, and everything I said I didn’t mean. It was word vomit. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s all good. I know you needed to let off steam.”

“It just wasn’t right of me at all.” She sniffed. “Whoever you date is going to be the luckiest person in the world, you know that? Because you are the nicest, most caring person I know and that’s a fact.”

He chuckled a little. “Thank you Jenna. And you know what? You’re gonna find that person too, I'm sure of it.” 

They had gone their separate ways after that, things finally back to normal. Tyler was thankful for another thing off his chest.

Halloween night, Tyler dressed up in a black dress shirt with a red tie, topping it off with bright red socks and a headband with devil horns. He wanted to be something subtle, and with the way he had been feeling lately, Satan was the way to go.

He had told his parents he was going to a Halloween party with his basketball team, and although he felt bad for lying, Tyler was excited to be able to spend time with Josh. He had no clue what he was getting himself into though.

Josh and his motorcycle were at the end of the street, Josh smiling widely the minute Tyler was in view. He was in nothing more than a skeleton patterned zip-up hoodie.

“Wow,” Tyler scoffed, “you went all out.”

Josh laughed. “Look at yourself dude. What are you supposed to be, the businessman from hell?”

“Excuse you, I’m actually the King of Hell. And I think I put a little more effort into my costume than you did. Where’d you find that hoodie, Goodwill?”

Josh gasped in fake hurt, his hand fluttering over his heart. “Ouch. That stings.”

Tyler chuckled, his teeth biting down on his lower lip as Josh ran fingers through his blue hair. “So... what are we doing at this party?”

“Senior checklist my friend. We’re going to cross off another thing.”

“Oh no.” He shook his head, ignoring Josh’s smirk as he slid his hands around Josh’s waist. “Do I wanna know?”

“I’ll keep it a secret for now. You’ll never see it coming.” he turned around to wink. “But I’m not going to force you to do anything. You know that, right?”

“Of course. I trust you.”

“Good.” Josh revved the engine, and the two shot off.

\---

Jack’s house was a nice two story home in a normal suburban neighborhood, and was the only house at the moment with fifty cars out in front of it. Lights flashed, music pounded, and Tyler felt his stomach drop. This was gonna be just like last time, wasn’t it?

Josh rested a hand on the small of Tyler’s back. “You doing okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine, just...” Tyler trailed off. He didn’t  _ have  _ to be here, he knew that, but any chance to spend time with Josh was time well spent. ‘Sides, he didn’t have to get raging drunk again, and maybe they could go off somewhere secluded again, and actually make out.

“Come on dude.” Josh grabbed ahold of his hand, taking him round back through a gate into Jack’s backyard. It was lit up with stringed lights and various Halloween decorations, the pool dyed red for the occasion. Tyler didn’t recognize anybody thankfully, just a bunch of random teenagers with their solo cups in huddled groups.

“Let’s go get a beer,” Josh yelled over the booming bass, pulling him into the kitchen through a sliding glass door. Equally as many people crowded the kitchen and they had to squeeze through to even reach the table. Josh was waving to practically everyone, who in return were giving him pats on the back.

A red cup was thrusted into Tyler’s hands, and then he was being shoved towards the living room, Josh following closely behind.

Until Tyler spotted Alex and Pete.

He froze, Josh slamming into the back of him, drenching Tyler’s entire back in sticky beer.

“Fuck,” Josh muttered, throwing his hands up in annoyance, his cup crushing in his hand. “Sorry.”

“I have to leave,” Tyler replied, eyes wide, undisturbed by the alcohol soaking through his shirt. After shoving his beer into Josh’s hands, he turned around and darted through the crowd, pushing past drunk dancers and red solo cups and the heavy stench of nicotine. He pushed open a door and went down the stairs to the basement, breathing finally starting to slow down at the lack of people that surrounded him. There were two kids playing air hockey in the corner and a couple draped across each other on the couch. Tyler sighed heavily and leaned against the wall, letting his eyelids slam shut.

“Tyler,” Josh’s rich voice was in his ear, “You okay?”

“I saw my friends,” Tyler whispered. “Sorry, I had to-”

“Say no more. I’ll uh, go see if I can get you a new shirt or something. Sorry, I didn’t mean to spill beer all over you.”

“It’s fine, I don’t care.” he opened his eyes and stared at Josh’s worried expression.

“I’ll be right back, okay? Stay here.” Josh pointed at him with a finger, taking a few steps back before pivoting and heading upstairs, chugging his entire cup of beer on the way up. Tyler allowed himself to slide down the wall and hiked his knees to his chest. He had forgotten Alex had mentioned coming to Jack’s Halloween party, and if Alex and Pete were here, than that meant everyone was here. They couldn’t see Tyler at this party, they couldn’t see him with  _ Josh Dun _ of all people, or else-

“Hey bro, everything okay?” a guy with dark hair stared at him from above, a plate of brownies in his hand. “Josh sent me down here to check on you.”

Tyler scowled. Of course Josh wouldn’t trust him to be on his own for two minutes. Being around people was the last thing Tyler wanted to do at the moment.“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Hey, you’re Tyler Joseph, aren’t you? Basketball point guard?” Tyler nodded, using all his willpower to not do anything rude. The dark haired kid squatted, and Tyler finally recognized him. This was Jack. “Cool. You want a brownie? They’re fresh.” He grinned.

Tyler looked at him for a few seconds, before reaching over to take one. He was feeling kind of hungry, especially after all of...  _ that. _ Jack watched him closely as Tyler took a bite, and an inappropriate noise left his mouth. “Dude, these are incredible!”

“Special ingredient. Go ahead, take as many as you want. They’ll be gone the minute I go upstairs.” he nodded towards the plate, and Tyler grabbed two more.

“Thank you.”

“Hey, no problem. See you later, huh?” Jack’s grin widened, and after a lopsided attempt at finger guns, Jack climbed upstairs.

\---

Josh came back downstairs to find Tyler lying on the floor. He squinted, tilted his head, and sat down with his legs crossed. “Sorry I took forever, I ran into Brendon and Gerard, and then Brendon threw up, and things were a mess. I got you a shirt though.” Josh gestured to the black t-shirt thrown over his shoulder. Tyler continued to stare at the ceiling. “Tyler?”

“Have you felt this carpet?” Tyler laughed. “It’s like... snow. It’s... soft, and, and...” He laughed again. “I forgot what I was saying.”

“Tyler,” Josh repeated, forcefully this time. His eyes widened. Tyler blinked. He felt like he was floating. “What did you do when I was gone?”

“I ate a, a, chocolate thingy. No.” Tyler pressed a finger to his bottom lip and furrowed his brow. “No, I ate  _ three _ of them.”

“Oh my god.” Josh groaned audibly and dragged a hand down his face. “God dammit Tyler, you do  _ not _ take food from people at parties!”

“But he was nice. He offered them to me, said I could take as many as I wanted. He’s your friend!”

Josh sat up and blinked a couple of times before he was pushing himself off the carpet and charging up the stairs. Tyler burst into another round of laughter and rolled onto his stomach, his eyes following the kids that were still playing air hockey. Was this real life? It didn’t feel real.

Two minutes later, Josh was stomping back over with his hand tightly around Jack’s wrist. Jack kept squirming and sighed when Josh released him to bend down and help Tyler sit up.

“Jack, you fucking idiot.” Josh glared at him. “You  _ fucking _ knew those brownies had weed in them!”

“Yeah, so?” Jack shrugged. “That’s Tyler Joseph man, I wanted to see him get baked.”

“Fuck you Jack,” Josh growled, shoving him away. He turned back towards Tyler and offered him a hand, helping him sit up. “Hey buddy, how you feeling?”

“Hungry,” Tyler replied. “You know, high school sucks.”

“I know dude, I know.” Josh patted him on the back and swung back towards Jack. “You see what you did? He’s going to be out of it for hours.”

“So?” Jack retaliated, crossing his arms. “You’ve smoked before.”

“It’s different dude, this isn’t about me, it’s about him. He doesn’t like that kind of stuff and you knowingly let him take it.”

“Don’t bring him to a party then asshole,” Jack disappeared upstairs, and Josh clenched his jaw. The kids playing air hockey stared at them. Tyler laughed.

“Alright Tyler, let’s get out of here.”

“Really?” he gripped the carpet in his hands. “I don’t want to leave the snow.”

“There’s more snow other places,” Josh offered, pulling Tyler on the ground and adjusted the slipping t-shirt off his shoulder. “We can go get tacos.”

“I love tacos!”

“You can get as many as you want.”

Tyler gasped. “Dude. I love you.”

Josh shook his head and ushered Tyler up the stairs and out the door.

\---

“Take your shirt off,” Josh demanded.

“School buses are so stupid, you know. They’re ugly, and full of horrible people. I don’t really understand how-” Tyler reached to undo his tie and froze. “How do I do this?”

Josh sighed. “C’mere, I’ll do it.” Tyler giggled the minute Josh’s hands touched his neck.

“Your hands are cold. My stomach hurts.”

“Yeah, yeah.” tie off, Josh started unbuttoning buttons and slid Tyler’s shirt off of him. “Arms up.” Tyler obeyed, and the tee slid down his torso. “Okay, Let’s go get tacos now. Can you promise not to let go of my waist?” Tyler nodded. “Good.”

“Can you kiss me?”

“Nope. Not until you're sober.”

“But I’m fine. Jus’ a little...” Tyler trailed off. “Oh my gosh! I jus’ realized, you’re a skeleton!”

Josh facepalmed. “Get on the motorcycle.”

\---

They went back to Josh’s “house” with a bag full of tacos, Tyler giggling the entire way there. Josh reminded himself to be patient about fifty times, and promised that Tyler would never encounter weed ever again without him around.

Tyler passed out around midnight, and woke up pouring sweat. He kicked off the blankets down to his ankles, tried to control his breathing, and glanced at his phone. 3:30 am.

_ Crap. _ Tyler knew he wasn’t at his house. He  _ knew _ they were going to be so upset with him. Shoot, shoot, shoot.

“Tyler?” Josh popped up from the floor, pulling himself up and sitting on the end of the bed. “Hey there. How you feeling?”

“Uhm... My head hurts a little, but otherwise I’m fine. Josh, why didn’t you take me home? My parents are going to freak!” Tyler paused to look at his phone once more. Seven text messages from his mother, four from his father, two from Zack... Yep. He was doomed.

“Tyler, you weren’t exactly yourself dude. Don’t you remember?”

“Yeah, I ate a brownie and-” He blinked. “Oh my gosh. I was high. Josh, I was  _ high!  _ Oh jeez.” Tyler buried his face in his hands and groaned loudly. “I’m so sorry.”

“Dude, don’t apologize. I’m sorry for leaving you alone. Didn’t realize my stupid friends were going to use you for their own personal entertainment.”

Tyler was quiet, picking at his fingernails. And then, “Can I be honest?”

“Of course.”

“It felt incredible, being high. I felt... light. Definitely wasn’t thinking about all the things I usually worry about.”

“Next time I’ll make sure you don’t inhale three weed brownies.”

Tyler laughed. “Okay, good. So... we can cross that off the senior checklist?”

“If you want to.” he moved closer, cautiously, making sure Tyler was okay. “I’m just saying though, that’s not how I wanted it to go.”

“Were you going to get me high?” a smirk made its way onto Tyler’s face the minute Josh’s hand touched his knee. Josh shrugged, but Tyler knew he was smiling too.

“Thought about it. Wasn’t going to make you or anything, only if you wanted to.”

“Guess we’ll have to do that again soon, huh?”

“I’d like that. Just the two of us though.”

“Of course! I think we’ll keep you away from the big parties from now. I don’t want my asshole friends taking advantage of you, and I definitely don’t want you to feel anxious for any other reason.”

Tyler sighed. Josh reached for his hand. “My friends said they were thinking about going to a halloween party, but I didn’t realize it was going to be  _ that _ party. I really gotta start being more careful.”

Josh nodded his head in agreement. “How you feeling?”

“You know what Josh?” Tyler pulled away from Josh’s grasp and turned towards him, his smile back. “I had a ton of fun tonight, and I’ve realized that I don’t  _ care  _ if we’re taking things too fast, cause I have a big fat freakin’ crush on you and if I get to kiss you whenever I want, then I  _ really  _ shouldn’t be complaining. ‘Sides... we can technically say we’re dating now, right? If we’re... going on dates and stuff?”

“I’d say so. I’d love to date you.”

“Okay then. We’re dating. That means you can kiss me.”

“Oh thank god.” Josh grinned, and it didn’t take long before he had leaned over, his hand threading in Tyler’s hair, pushing him onto his back, straddling him. Tyler hummed happily, his hands finding Josh’s hips, and everything, all at once, went away. It was just him and Josh, and Tyler really didn’t understand why he had ever thought he could take things slow.

“You want me to take you home?” Josh murmured against Tyler’s jaw.

“Home can wait,” Tyler replied, and Josh went back to kissing him.

\---

Tyler woke up again right as the sun was rising, and with a grumble tried to stretch, his hand completely smacking Josh in the face.

“Shit!” Josh muttered, his entire body flinching as he used the heel of his palm to rub his nose. Tyler blushed.

“Sorry.”

“You’re fine. My fault for swallowing you alive.” Josh grinned, noddings towards their mess of entangled limbs. With a heavy breath, Josh rolled out from underneath Tyler and went to press a kiss to his cheek. Instead, his lips hovered.

“Dude?” Tyler turned his head to look Josh in the eyes. “What are you-”

“Can I kiss you?”

“Yes!” Tyler laughed, and Josh finally closed the gap, on his lips this time. Tyler melted into the bed, his hands finding Josh’s hips, dipping right below the waistband of his sweatpants. Josh’s skin was soft and squishy, and a thought came to Tyler’s mind before he could remind himself to keep it in.

“I wanna have sex with you.”

Josh sat up. He blinked a couple of times, adjusted his shirt, and ran a hand through his hair. “What?”

“I said I wanna... you know. Do the do.” He could feel his face burning red and wanted to die. Why did he say that out loud?

“No, I heard you. I’m just... shocked is all.” His confused expression melted into a smug grin. “Tyler Joseph said a naughty word. Tsk tsk.”

“That’s not a naughty word!” Tyler tried to argue, crossing his arms across his chest. He wished he could have the world swallow him whole. “I’m just saying.”

“Well, we probably could make time, I’d have to lock the door and steal a condom from-”

“Not right now! Gah!” Tyler shook his head rapidly. “I’m just saying. If there comes a time, when things are perfect, and the moment’s right, if you wanna, you know, you can go for it. Besides, and this is a pretty big uh, statement for me to put out, so don’t judge, I’ve sort of, found myself thinking about what your, uhm,” Tyler pointed to his crotch and covered his eyes with a hand out of pure embarrassment. Why was he saying this again? “Your uh, thingy.”

Josh’s smirk grew bigger. “My thingy?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh Tyler, you are so pure.” he burst into laughter, tackling Tyler back down onto the bed to kiss him again. “Course I’d wanna have sex with you bro.”

“How can you say it so nonchalantly?” Tyler’s face was still bright red, like he was a tomato instead of a person.

“Practice, time, you name it. By the way, it’s called a dick.”

Tyler groaned, his eyes still squeezed shut as Josh laughed again and went back to covering Tyler’s neck in kisses. After a few minutes, Josh pulled back with a sigh and reached for his phone. “I should probably take you home Ty. Your parents aren’t going to be happy.”

Tyler sighed. “Yeah. I know.”

“Tell them you ended up spending the night at Dallon’s or something. Might make them feel a bit better, yeah?”

“Yeah, probably.” With another audible sigh, Tyler reached for his own phone and finally called his mother back. His stomach twisted with fright.

“TYLER ROBERT JOSEPH!” Tyler pulled the phone away from his ear and squeezed his eyes tight. He knew Josh was watching him. “Where on EARTH have you been?”

“I’m sorry Mom, I completely forgot to call you and then so much happened that I totally spaced out. I spent the night at Dallon’s house last night.”

His mother let out a deep breath, and Tyler pictured her rubbing her temples like she always did when she knew she was developing a headache. “Tyler, I know we all make mistakes, but I was scared out of my mind. You never said you were staying the night. I was up at one in the morning waiting for you.”

“I know, and I’m so sorry. Trust me, it was never my intention to freak you out.”

“I know sweetheart, and I know you just got ungrounded and you were probably a little distracted. It’s okay, just don't let it happen again. Are you coming home soon or do I need to come pick you up?”

“I’m coming home,” Tyler said a little too fast, glancing up at Josh staring at him. “I’ll be home in twenty minutes or so.”

“Okay. Just, promise me you’ll never do that ever again?”

“Yeah Mom, I promise.”

“Thank you. See you soon.” the phone call clicked off, and Tyler let his phone fall into his lap. He looked back up at Josh. “That went better than I thought it would.”

“They trust you, huh?”

“Yeah. And lately I’ve been doing a lot of things I probably shouldn’t be.” Tyler scoffed a little. “It’s kind of a rush though. I like it.”

“What happened to the old Tyler?” Josh was grinning again, watching Tyler as he climbed out of bed to collect his clothes from the previous night.

“Shut up. I’m still trying to figure myself out.” he clutched his dress shirt in his hand, running the fabric of his tie in between his fingers. A hand on his shoulder caused Tyler to jump a little, but of course it was only Josh.

“I’m here for you, you know that, right?”

“Yeah. Of course I know that.”

“Good. Let’s get you home, huh?”

“Yeah.” Josh smiled and pushed open the bedroom door.


	9. High School is NOTHING Like High School Musical

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tyler finds himself in a couple pickles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think that movie took a lot of artistic license.

The trees no longer had any leaves, frost gathered on car windows, and basketball season started.

The team was pretty good this year, with returning players and some new varsity sophomores that blew Tyler’s mind. Tyler himself was this year's captain and returning point guard. After their first practice, all those free throws suddenly seemed worth it.

Sweaty with hair matted to his forehead, Tyler gathered his team into a huddle and glanced around at all his teammates, giving Dallon a small smile in the process. “I gotta feeling this season is gonna be a good one,” Tyler started, and was met with cheers and whistles. “We have to give it our all everyone, understand? We’ve gotta win every game.” he cleared his throat and wiped away some sweat with the back of his hand. “Alright everyone, see you tomorrow for practice. Remember, Friday we’re having that bonfire at Dallon’s house. Check the group chat for the address.” Everyone nodded in confirmation. “Hands in.”

The group chanted, yelled, and just like that, everyone dispersed. Tyler made his way to the locker room to grab his duffle bag and pulled out his water bottle.

“Hey there wildcat.” With a yelp, his water bottle fell to the floor and he jumped back against the lockers with a loud  _ bang. _ Josh laughed. “Jesus dude, you jumped like four feet in the air!”

“What are you doing here?” Tyler narrowed his eyes as he bent down to retrieve his bottle and downed half the thing on his way back up. He could feel Josh’s eyes on him.

“Came to say hello. Knew you were at practice, hoped I could catch you all... sweaty and athletic and stuff.”

Tyler scrunched his nose up and turned around to grab the rest of the stuff out of his locker. “Dude, do you have a sweat kink or something?”

“No! I’m just saying. You look hot. I was right.” Although he couldn’t see it, Tyler knew Josh was smirking.

“Shut up dude. We’re going to get caught.”

“We aren’t going to get caught, it’s the locker room. Chill. ‘Sides,” he stepped forward, his hands going to rest on Tyler’s shoulders, “seeing you all, authoritative and stuff, was fucking attractive.”

Tyler scoffed, nudged Josh off of him, and swung his bag over his shoulders. “You’re getting reckless Josh.”

“No I’m not. You’re telling me I don’t have access to the locker room because I’m not an athlete? I took P.E., so I’m basically an athlete.”

“Shut up.” Tyler rolled his eyes, but he was smiling now too. Josh pushed him back up against the locker and slid his duffle bag off his shoulder and to the floor, his hands finding their way to Tyler’s hips. A chill ran down Tyler’s spine.

“Are you nervous?” Josh murmured, leaning forward. His lips pressed against Tyler’s neck, causing Tyler to lean his head back and close his eyes. He  _ knew _ they shouldn’t have been doing this, but he didn’t want to push Josh away.  _ This,  _ whatever it was, felt nice. It felt right.

“A little.” Tyler whispered back. Josh bit down, teeth sinking down into skin, and Tyler let out a small whimper. “Nu-uh. Don’t you dare.”

Josh smirked against Tyler’s neck, and flicked his tongue out, licking all the way up to his jaw. Tyler shifted underneath him and moved his head to expose more skin. Tyler moaned again.

“You’re stalking me, aren’t you?”

Josh pulled away and blinked. “No. Why you say that?”

“How’d you know about practice? I didn’t tell you that.”

Josh blushed, frickin’  _ blushed, _ and went to rub the back of his neck. “I uh... heard it somewhere. I just wanted to see you, okay? Now we’re really gonna have no time to hang out because you have to be all athletic and stuff.”

“Listen. I have a game next Friday.”

“I’ll be there.” Josh nodded his head firmly.

“You told me you’d get me high again, remember that?” Tyler grinned, and Josh shook his head.

“Yeah. I remember. Alright, the game, and then we get fucking baked.”

“Don’t say it like that.” This time, Tyler shook his head as he bent down to retrieve his bag for the umpteeth time. “It’s gonna be lowkey, okay? Nothing too much.”

“I know, I know.”

“I’ll see you at school tomorrow, kay? Meet me in the restroom during my lunch. I’ll let you kiss me.”

“That’s saucy, Bolton.” Josh’s smile grew wider as he followed Tyler out of the locker room and into the parking lot. “I’ll be looking forward to that.”

“Okay.” Tyler stopped outside his car, his hand on the door handle. “I’ll see you then.”

“Yeah. See you then.” Josh stood awkwardly for a few minutes before he popped the collar of his leather jacket and disappeared across the school parking lot to his motorcycle. Tyler watched him drive away.

“He’s absolutely smitten with me,” he said to himself, grinning ear to ear, before tossing his bag in the back seat and driving home.

\---

Tyler stopped Dallon in the hallway on their way to class Friday afternoon. “Hey, that bonfire thing is tonight, right?”

Dallon raised an eyebrow. “Tyler, you should know that.”

“I know. Sorry, I’ve been distracted.”

“Guess I can’t blame you for that, huh?” Dallon grinned. “You gonna bring marshmallows? We wanted to do s’mores.”

“Yeah, I was gonna grab ‘em after school.”

“Sick. I’m glad we can do this dude. I miss hanging out with you.”

“Yeah, we just don’t have a lot of time to do anything this year, do we?” Tyler smiled softly. “I’ll have to catch you for a game of Horse, just like old times.”

“Sounds like a plan. See you later! Be there at 6!” Dallon called as he disappeared into his classroom.

“Sure thing!” Tyler watched Dallon leave, wondering if their plans would fall through just like every other time before.

\---

After school, Josh followed Tyler out to the parking lot and climbed into the passenger seat. Tyler blinked a couple of times. He wasn't surprised or anything, because, yeah, this was pretty normal. “Hey dude.”

“Hey. You busy?”

“I got this basketball bonfire thing tonight, but I guess I don’t have to be there until 6. I do gotta grab marshmallows though.”

A smirk rose to Josh’s face. “Does that mean I can come with you?”

Tyler rolled his eyes playfully. “I guess.”

Josh snorted. “Tell me how you really feel, why don’t you?” Tyler focused on driving, one hand on the steering wheel, his eyes darting in all directions to avoid oncoming traffic and the people trying to scoot past him. Josh straightened his posture and cleared his throat. “So uh... I just realized that I might be coming on too strong? And if I am... I wanna apologize for that. I don’t want you to be bothered by me or anything.”

“Josh, I’d never be bothered by you. I love spending time with you.”

He let out a sigh of relief. “Thank god. I-”

Tyler’s eyes widened at that very moment, and cut Josh off by pushing his head down below the window. Josh slunk as far down into his seat as possible and didn’t dare to breathe.

“Sorry,” Tyler finally whispered, even though he really had no purpose to be doing that. His hands shook as he turned out of the parking lot. “Alex was walking to his car.”

“It’s okay. I sorta assumed.”

“I’m sorry Josh. I really don’t like keeping you a secret, there’s just so much going on.”

Josh nodded. “I understand.” A pause. “Does Dallon know?”

“Uhm... no. He doesn’t.”

“Are you gonna tell him?”

“I wasn’t planning on it.”

“Tyler...” Josh shook his head. “I think you should probably do that. I mean, Brendon knows about us, and he’s my best friend. Does Dallon even know you’re gay?”

“I mean, sorta...” Josh raised an eyebrow and Tyler sighed. “No. I just, I’ve been reluctant to tell him.”

“I’m not going to pressure you into anything, I just think you should think about it. Trust, you know? I confide in Brendon for everything. He’s my lifesaver. And we need someone to be able to talk to about things we can talk about with anyone else.”

Tyler sighed. “Yeah. I know.”

“I just don’t want you to be living in fear.”

“I know.” his grip on the steering wheel tightened. For some reason, Josh’s words were really getting under his skin. Thing was, Tyler  _ was  _ afraid. Afraid of getting caught, of being seen, of the consequences that would come if someone found out. If his parents found out, if his brothers found out, if his friends found out.

And maybe that was why he was so afraid of telling Dallon. If he told one person, things could just... spiral out of control. This was his secret,  _ Josh _ was his secret, and Tyler wasn’t ready to give him up yet.

\---

After stopping at the grocery store for marshmallows, Tyler tossed the bag in the backseat of his car and the two went to Taco Bell. They sat in the back of the restaurant, tucked away from where anyone could recognize the jock and the punk.

“You doing okay Tyler?” Josh seemed worried, more worried than he had been leaving school earlier. Tyler had slowly been losing his smile over time, Josh’s words echoing in his mind.  _ I don’t want you living in fear. _

How was he supposed to stop?

“I’m nervous,” Tyler responded without looking up. He pushed his half eaten nachos around with a fork. “Because you’re right Josh. I  _ am _ scared. And I don’t want to be. Because you’ve put me in a place where I’m  _ enjoying _ life. I like being with you. I like spending time with you. I feel comfortable around you. I trust you. And honestly, I like keeping you to myself. You’re my secret, my safe place, my rush of adrenaline. You’re allowing me to branch outside of my comfort zone and do things I would have never done on my own, and I like that. I’m sorry that sometimes I’m a mess and sometimes I get uptight. I’m trying to work on that, but you know, being raised one way and being introduced into something completely different is a lot for me to take in all at once.”

It felt like hours before Josh replied. He scooted their empty tray out of the way and rested his hand on top of Tyler’s. “I know you’re nervous, and I know you’re scared. I am too, you know that?”

Tyler looked up at him in confusion. Why was he scared?

With a sigh, Josh slumped back against his chair and ran a hand through his fading hair. Tyler wondered when he was going to re-dye it - a good part of it was back to his natural brown. “I was forced out of the closet man. I hadn’t planned to tell the world I was gay. I told Debby because I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, and she kinda, well, yeah. She told my parents. She told her friends. She told everyone. And now everyone at school looks at me like I’m dirt at the bottom of the barrel. It’s hard. And of course my friends are there for me, but it gets to be a little too much sometimes when I hear people whispering about me in the hallway. I know not everyone cares, but I let the little stuff get to me. It’s something I struggle with. I think... I think I’m so scared about where this is going Tyler, because I’ve have the absolute  _ biggest _ crush on you for the longest time, and I thought I had no chance. Absolutely no chance. Because you’re popular. You’re athletic, and smart, and talented. I know I’m clingy and I’m constantly breathing down your back, but I have this fear that this is all some dare or joke. That one day you’re going to laugh in my face and call me names like everyone else. That you don’t really like me.” he started to get choked up halfway through, and Tyler felt his heart sinking. He hadn’t realized Josh felt this way. He hadn’t realized he had so much stuff bottled up.

They really didn’t know that much about each other.

“I promise you this is not a joke, or a dare. You mean so much to me. You feel like... like home. Which is weird I think, because we really don’t know that much about each other and we haven’t been dating that long, but I think our personalities just click. Josh, I’m so, so sorry that stuff happened to you. And I wish I could do something more than just, say words. You don’t deserve that. And you don’t deserve the treatment you get from people. You certainly didn’t deserve it from me. I judged you, and all of you guys without getting to know you. And now that I know how sweet you are, how kind and caring you are, I feel terrible.” Tyler chuckled a little. “You’ll only kiss me when I’m sober and can give consent.”

“Well yeah,” Josh replied, smiling softly. “That’s how it always should be.”

“And that’s what I’m talking about. You’re incredible. And I want this to work.  _ God, _ do I want this to work.”

“As do I.”

“Then we just gotta keep doing what we’re doing, okay?”

Josh nodded. “Okay.”

\---

A week passed, and Tyler spent all his free time with Josh. After basketball practice, Tyler went straight to Brendon’s house to do homework with Josh. Josh usually didn’t do his homework, but watched Tyler do his instead. Tyler ignored his parent’s constant phone calls and accepted the consequences when he got home. It was usually nothing too bad, during the season they didn’t make him shoot as many hoops, and Tyler was getting better and better at lying.

The scary thing, was that he didn’t even feel bad anymore.

Friday morning, Tyler picked Josh up from Brendon’s house. He had a game the next day, the first game of the season, and Tyler was feeling quite nervous. He knew his team was ready, but there was still a pang in his chest.

“You’re going to do great,” Josh promised with a grin, his hands fiddling with his cell phone. Tyler scoffed, but said nothing more.

He went to the bathroom in the middle of his biology class, his attention fully on his phone, madly spamming Josh with texts to meet him during lunch.

What Tyler found in the bathroom, however, was beyond anything he couldn’t have been ready for.

Noises, and obscene ones too, were coming from the handicap stall at the end of the restroom. Tyler glanced at the mirror, his face twisting in concern when he heard the door unlock. He should have left the bathroom, but instead Tyler jumped into a stall of his own and crouched on the toilet seat.  _ Crap. Oh crap. _

“I think you’re getting better at that.”  _ Oh crap crap crap.  _ Tyler recognized that guy’s voice.

“I think so too. What are you doing to me?” Tyler recognized the second voice too. The guy chuckled, and then there was a dull  _ thud _ as his back hit the cement wall. More noises came from the other side of the closed stall door and Tyler felt like he was going pass out.

His foot slipped, dipping into the toilet bowl, and then it flushed. Darn automatic toilets.

Tyler really felt like he was going to die now. His heart stopped as the noises stopped and then that familiar voice called out.

“Who’s there?”

Tyler quietly shook toilet water off his sneaker.  _ Please God, if you’re up there, don’t let them see me, please- _

“Come out dude, you’re being a creep. And congrats on already being a perv.”

Tyler gave up. With a small sigh, he unlocked the door, and exited the stall.

Dallon and Brendon stared back at him.

Dallon’s hair was disheveled, his belt undone and zipper down, while Brendon’s pants were to his ankles. Finally, everything made sense.

Dallon hadn’t been spending all his time doing college stuff, he’d been with Brendon. He lost his virginity to Brendon. He was acting weird because of Brendon, and Brendon was acting weird because of Dallon. Tyler  _ knew _ he recognized those voices.

Pale and already drenched in sweat, Tyler backed up until he hit the wall on the other side of the restroom. His stomach twisted, his heart was beating so quickly it made him physically sick, and Tyler was freaking out.

“Tyler, I can explain,” Dallon started, immediately going to fix his pants. Brendon did the same thing, but unlike Dallon, he was smirking. Oh, that’s right. Brendon knew Tyler’s secret.

Tyler’s eyes widened. Was this why Josh had been so avid about him telling Dallon? Did Josh know about this? He stumbled, closed his eyes.

“Woah man, you doing okay?” Brendon sounded worried. Tyler could hear the shuffling of his footsteps.

“We’re dating, I wanted to tell you, please believe me, I wanted to tell you-”

“Dallon, cool it.”

“Tyler, what can we do?”

Tyler didn’t reply. He felt hands on his shoulders, but refused to open his eyes. “I’m going to throw up.”

“Tyler, I’m  _ so _ sorry-”

“Dallon, stop it!” Brendon’s voice raised in volume. He squeezed Tyler’s shoulder. “Should I take you to the nurse?”

“Yeah, that might be-” his vision swayed. Tyler was in absolute shock. “good.”

“We gotta get him to the nurse,” Brendon muttered mostly to himself. That was the last thing Tyler heard.

\---

He woke up to the grey walls of the nurse’s office. Tyler coughed a little as he sat up and tried to remember what the heck happened.

“Sweetheart, don’t move, okay?” The nurse appeared by his side. She had a kind face, which calmed Tyler a little bit. He hadn’t been to the nurse’s office, like, ever, usually going to the trainer instead. “You fainted.”

“Oh yeah,” Tyler muttered. That’s right. His best friend was sleeping with Josh’s best friend.

“You want some water?”

“Please.” she gave him a small smile and pulled a water bottle from a mini fridge behind her desk. Tyler thanked her with a head nod and chugged half the bottle. God, he felt awful. Maybe it wasn’t just the fact that he walked in on Dallon doing... something with Brendon.

“Honey, did you eat breakfast?”

“No, but I have lunch after my next class. Or is that now? How long was I out?”

“Not very long. Some friends brought you here, said you passed out in the bathroom. I went ahead and checked your vitals. You have a fever.”

“Really? I feel fine, honestly.” he tried to climb off the cot, but she was having none of that.

“You’re sick Tyler. People don’t just pass out when they’re fine. You’re most likely exhausted sweetheart. I called your mother. She’s gonna come and get you.”

“No, no. I have a game tonight, if I’m not at school the whole day, I can’t play-”

“Tyler, you passed out. You need to rest. I know it’s stressful, but there will be other games.”

“Gah!” Tyler groaned in aggravation and flopped back down against the cot. The nurse gave him another sympathetic smile and patted his leg.

“I’m sorry hun. She’ll be here in five minutes.” she went back to her desk after that, and Tyler pulled out his phone to answer the incoming mass of texts from his friends.

 

Alexander the Great (10:00 am)

 

_ Dude, Tyler, you doing alright dude? _

 

Ur Boy Pete (10:00 am)

 

_ What happened? _

 

Alexander the Great (10:00 am)

 

_ Heard a rumor Tyler passed out _

 

Trick (10:01 am)

 

_ WHAT??!! _

 

Tyler sighed. Yeah, he should have known news would spread fast.

 

Tyjo (10:34 am)

 

_ I’m fine. Nurse is sending me home. Apparently I have a fever and I’m “exhausted” _

 

Immediately after, the chat filled with texts about how Tyler wouldn’t be able to play in the basketball game and how they were going to lose, and someone mentioned something about a college scout being there for college basketball. Tyler tried to ignore all of it. The nurse was right. It was only one game.

His phone buzzed again.

 

Joshua (10:35 am)

 

_ Tyler where r u? _

 

_ Oh crap. Don’t tell me that rumor was real _

 

Tyjo (10:35 am)

 

_ Yeah unfortunately it was real... I’m going home. Can’t play the game tonight :( which means we can’t chill or anything either _

 

Joshua (10:36 am)

 

_ Shit dude, I’m sorry. Feel better, I’ll call you later _

 

“Tyler honey, your mom is in the office. You’re free to go.” the nurse called, and Tyler pocketed his cell phone. There was so much going on in his life at the moment, so it sort of made sense why he would be exhausted and be forgetting to take care of himself. Seeing Brendon and Dallon together must have been his breaking point.

He just prayed the team wouldn’t lose the game.


	10. Punks Get Stitches and the Jocks Are Bitches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex Gaskarth is a dick, Tyler decides.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alex is my fave. I mean no ill will towards him.
> 
> Also warning for some homophobic behavior in this chapter, just a heads up
> 
> And sorry the last update was like two weeks ago, whoops

Yeah, they lost the game.

Tyler was annoyed. Very,  _ very _ annoyed. Tyler wanted his team to win every game, and losing one was fine, but to lose the first game was the absolute worst. That dropped the bar low for all the other schools, putting them dead last.

“So much for championships,” he muttered under his breath as he closed the snapchat a teammate had sent him of the scoreboard. He let his phone fall in his lap and sighed.

He was confined to his bed for the rest of the night and most likely the rest of the weekend, his mother refusing to even let him get up for food. Everything was finally starting to get to him.

There was a knock at his door a few minutes later. Tyler assumed it was his mother and called her in, snuggling deeper under his duvet. She was probably just here to lecture him about something stupid. But it wasn’t his mother that came into his room.

It was Dallon.

His face was red, hair matted down with sweat, and Tyler assumed he had come straight from the game. He looked nervous as he sat down on the end of Tyler’s bed. “Hey.”

Tyler sat up instantly and glared, crossing his arms for dramatic effect. He hoped he was doing an okay job of being passive agressive. “How was the game?”

“Pretty crappy without you there. We lost.”

“Yeah. I heard.”

“Tyler... I’m sorry. For everything.” Dallon sighed. “I never wanted to lie to you, but I found myself doing it anyways. I especially never wanted you to find out like that. And I’m so sorry. I got scared. I don’t know, I know we had been talking about that kind of stuff, but there was still a part of me that was nervous you’d think different of me if I told you I was dating a guy.” he paused to rub the back of his neck and refused to make eye contact. Tyler didn’t look at him either, feeling just as guilty, because this was the whole reason he hadn’t told Dallon about Josh. “I don’t really know how Brendon and I started dating. He just, he was so nice to me Tyler. He was kind, and caring, and I felt free when I was with him. And one night, we just, I don’t know. We had sex. I don’t really remember how it happened, but dude, that’s the happiest I’ve ever been. I think I’m in love with him man.” he scoffed. “I don’t really know what to think about that.”

Tyler started picking at his comforter. He knew he’d have to tell Dallon about Josh now. It was only fair. “Dal, are you happy?”

“Yeah man. I’m ecstatic. I don’t think I’ve felt this happy in so long. And you know, at first, I felt guilty, because being gay, doing stuff with guys, having  _ sex, _ all that stuff is frowned upon. But I dunno. I’m not guilty anymore. This is who I am.” he shrugged. “It’s who I’ve always been. I’ve never really believed in half the stuff we’re told at church. Like, no caffeine? Dude. I can’t live without my Dr. Pepper. Thank goodness my parents aren’t strict.”

That got Tyler to crack a smile. “Have you told your parents?”

“Not that we’re dating, because they would  _ not _ be happy with that information, but Brendon comes over a lot. He’s made a great impression with my family.”

“It makes sense why Brendon told me to tell you,” Tyler said out loud, remembering his conversation with the punk when he first admitted to someone that he wasn’t straight. After a few more seconds of pondering, he finally looked up at his best friend’s confused expression.

“What?”

Tyler took a deep breath, massaged his temples, blinked rapidly. Here went nothing. “Dallon, I’m dating Josh.”

Silence. And then, “I know.”

Tyler blinked. “What?”

“I know. I was over at Brendon’s house one time, when the two of you were there. I uhm, saw some stuff, and Brendon explained, you know, what was going on. You two weren’t doing much, just laying pretty much on top of one another, and man, I hadn’t even realized you were spending time with him. Anyways, after you left, Josh and Brendon both talked to me. I wasn’t going to tell you I knew, because I wanted it to be something you came to me about. So now my question for you: are  _ you _ happy?”

It was almost a load off of Tyler’s shoulder to hear that Dallon knew, and hadn’t thought any different of it. “Yeah. I am. Josh makes me happy. He’s so encouraging and kind. None of the people we’re friends with really are that way, you know?”

“Yeah, trust me. I know. I don’t feel comfortable around the people we sit with. That’s why I don’t sit there as much anymore. I feel bad leaving you alone, but the crap they talk about... I can't deal with it.”

“I try to avoid them too actually. It’s just hard for me to leave and get them to stop pestering me.”

Dallon was quiet for a few seconds. “Have you slept with Josh?”

“No.”

“Do you want to?”

Tyler blushed. “Yeah.”

Dallon grinned. “The time will come Ty. You’ll know when it’s the right time.”

“Dallon?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you for talking to me. You’re my best friend man, and I can’t stress enough how incredible you are as a person. I love you.”

“I love you too dude.” Dallon leaned over to give Tyler a side hug. “I’m sorry I made you pass out.”

Tyler laughed. “Nah, it wasn’t fully you. You gonna stay with me for a little while?”

“Of course I am.”

“Good.”

\---

Tyler got back on his feet in no time, and his life went back to a rinse and repeat schedule. School, basketball, homework. There wasn’t much time for anything else.

Spending time with Josh was proving to be more and more difficult, and the lies were getting harder to top. They met during lunch every day, tucked away in the restroom at the end of the hall, laughing, touching, kissing, and pausing whenever there was noise. It was an absolute rush for Tyler.

Josh came to every single one of Tyler’s basketball games. He’d sit in the stands, in the same spot every time, a seat in the very back against the wall, and scream every time Tyler had the ball, every time he made a shot or blocked the other team. 

His cheers were always the loudest.

Finally though,  _ finally,  _ Tyler has a Friday off, and he met Josh behind the bleachers at their school. Josh sat on a raggedy, torn blanket with a cigarette in his hand and a grin on his face. He patted the spot next to him.

One whiff of the smoke was all Tyler needed to know that it was not a cigarette at all. He shrugged his bag off his shoulders and sat down, crossing his legs.

“Hey wildcat,” Josh said softly, crushing his blunt into the gravel next to him. He dusted off his hands and draped them over his knees. “How are you?”

“I’m alright. Sorry I didn’t see you at school today, I had a doctor’s appointment.”

“It’s okay, figured you were busy or something. Tyler Joseph would  _ never  _ ditch school.” Josh grinned as Tyler rolled his eyes.

“Ha ha. So funny.”

Josh nudged him with the toe of his shoe. “What’d you bring?”

“Oh yeah!” Tyler pulled his bag towards him and unzipped it, revealing three family sized bags of assorted chips. “Figured we might get hungry, after, you know.”

“Heh. Yeah. Alright, I’m gonna start you off slow, okay?”

“Sure. Would you maybe, uh, put on some music?”

“Like I wasn't going to do that anyways.” Josh paused to fiddle with his phone, clicking on a playlist. The music was soft and gentle and fit the mood perfectly, what with the moon spilling through the cracks of the bleachers and the sky a perfect twilight. Josh pulled his lighter from his pocket - a tiny black Bic - and a flame flickered to life as he pulled out another thin, white joint. It burned quickly, small orange embers gleaming in the darkness. Tyler blinked. He couldn’t believe he was about to do this. Eating was much,  _ much _ different than smoking. “Dude, you know I’m not condoning drug use here, right? I mean, I smoke, but I’m not gonna force you to-”

“Yeah, yeah,” Tyler waved his hand in mild annoyance. “Quit being so overprotective and tell me what to do.”

Josh smiled a little, one of his dimples shining under the moonlight. “You’re going to take a breath. Don’t go too fast, just let it settle in your lungs, okay?”

“Yeah.” Tyler watched Josh do it first. He settled back, leaning against his palm as he took a long drag and breathed out smoke. Tyler closed his eyes and let the haze settle around him. “You got it?”

“Yeah,” Tyler repeated, leaning forward to take the joint from Josh’s fingers. He stared at it for a few seconds before raising it to his mouth. He breathed quickly, sucked it in, and set fire to his throat. Immediately Tyler pulled away and coughed loudly, his eyes burning.  _ Oh jeez, _ why did he do that? He squeezed them shut and blinked a few more times. “Ouch.”

“Dude, what do you not understand by the words ‘don’t go too fast?’”

“S-Sorry, I wasn’t t-thinking.” He clutched his heart with a hand and tried to take normal breath. So much for a relaxing night.

“Here, let me try something else. Might be a little easier.” Josh took the joint from Tyler’s hands and scooted closer until their faces were mere inches apart. “It’s called shotgunning. I’m gonna blow smoke into your mouth.”

“Uh, okay.”

Josh took a long puff, and with a small gesture Tyler opened his mouth to allow smoke to billow in. It was warm, and didn’t taste the best, but a wave a calmness fell over him. Tyler closed his eyes again, but left his mouth parted and sighed every time that familiar warmness entered his mouth. Josh’s lips pressed against his, barely, and it took Tyler everything he had not to deepen the kiss.

It took Josh three times before Tyler answered. He opened his eyes and stared at the blue haired boy. “Huh?”

Josh laughed. “I’d say it’s working.”

“This is nice,” Tyler whispered. Josh’s hand dug into his shoulder and he reached up to trail his fingers across the bruises on Josh’s knuckles. “What happened there?”

“I visited my parents,” Josh replied. His voice was calm and collected as he took one last drag. There really wasn’t much left of the joint, but Josh doesn’t seem to notice. “Nothing changed. I’m still shit to them. So I punched a wall. Broke some things. And left again.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t talk about it. It’s not important. This is.” Josh gestured around them and leaned in closer. “One more go?”

“Doesn’t seem to be a lot left for that.” Tyler’s voice was a murmur. Josh leaned in closer,  _ closer,  _ until he could bite down on Tyler’s bottom lip. It was gentle, soft, and stirred a small moan of out him.

“That’s okay, right?” Josh shifted himself into Tyler’s lap, his hands sliding to Tyler’s hips. The world was one giant haze, and everything felt fine, like fate was pushing them to be here together at this moment in time.

“Yeah,” Tyler pushed forward, his hand curling in Josh’s hair. “I think I like your hair better brown.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.” Josh’s tongue found its way into Tyler’s mouth. Tyler whimpered again.

“I’ll let it grow out then.” Tyler was lost in a buzz, the world spinning around him. He wondered if this was what love felt like.

He wondered if he was in love with Josh. 

Could he be, this early into a relationship? Would he be rushing things if he mentioned it? It was almost December, the semester was almost over, so who knew?

Tyler flinched as Josh’s cold hands slid under his shirt and thumbed over his ribs. He settled back into the kiss in mere seconds.

They kissed for what felt like hours, running fingers over skin, curling in hair, bunching in the fabric of their shirts. It was Josh who finally separated himself and rolled off Tyler’s lap to reach for the bag of Doritos.

“I’m starving,” he said, grinning, as he ripped open the bag. Tyler flopped onto his back and stared up at the bleachers.

“Pass me the chips.”

\---

Two days later a fight broke out in the lunchroom, and Tyler wanted nothing more than to crawl into the corner and hide. He had no clue what Josh was doing in the lunchroom. It wasn’t his lunch period, so why was he  _ there? _

He had gotten reckless, Tyler knew that. Josh had texted him to  _ come to the restroom at the end of the hall, _ and Tyler told him he had homework he needed to get done before the next couple of classes. So Josh had come to him.

Josh hadn’t spoken, just walked by Tyler’s table and softly touched his back. It was a gesture that brought a smile to Tyler’s face, but apparently someone else noticed it to.

Alex.

Tyler knew this day was going to come, the day where Alex decided to get physical with one of the punks. Honestly, Tyler was surprised he hadn’t hurt Jack yet. 

But Josh seemed to really strike a nerve in Alex, and when Josh walked by, Alex muttered “faggot,” under his breath.

Tyler heard him, heard him  _ very  _ well, and looked over at Alex with a disgusted look. He wanted to defend Josh, but nothing would come out of his mouth. He was too much of a coward to defend his own boyfriend.

The table was in utter disbelief, no one saying a word as Josh stopped dead in his tracks. Tyler felt his heart stop.  _ Please let it go Josh, please let it go, let it go, let it go, let it go! _

Josh turned around slowly, his jaw clenched. “What did you say to me?”

Alex smirked as he turned his head to look over at Josh. “You heard me Dun. I called you a faggot. That’s what you are, right? Sucking every little cock you can find?”

Tyler had never seen Josh so mad in his life. He wanted to tell Alex to stop. Tyler’s mouth refused to open. He knew his face was red, and his knuckles were white from clutching his pencil so hard.

Josh scoffed. “Excuse me? You don’t know me.” he turned to leave when Alex had to go and make things a thousand times worse.

“I know enough about you, heard enough rumors, to know you’ve probably had a dick up your ass.”

Tyler’s pencil snapped in his hand. The entire lunchroom seemed to be in silence. A few people at their table snickered, but the rest stared down at their laps. This couldn’t be real. This had to be a nightmare.

Seconds passed like hours, Josh frozen to the floor like he forgot how to move. Nobody dared to breath.

Then, in the blink of an eye, Josh whipped around quickly and punched Alex in the face, completely knocking him from his chair. The room filled with “oohs” as Alex spat blood out and looked at Josh in disbelief, like he couldn’t believe Josh had that in him. Slowly, he pushed himself off the floor. A few more neverending seconds passed.

“You’re fucking DEAD DUN!” Alex launched himself at Josh, sending him flying to the tile below. He pulled on Josh’s hair and managed to hit him several times in the face. Josh yelled curse word after curse word, and to make matters worse, others got involved, pushed out of their chairs in laughter and helped turn Josh into a bloody mess. By the time the principals came to break it up, Josh had three people on him. Tyler had pushed out of his chair at this point, his notebook clutched to his chest, as he backed up against the wall. He felt wobbly, unstable, watching as the principals pulled the boys apart, as Josh’s arms were pulled behind him, blood gushing from his nose, his busted lip, and his eye swelled shut. Tyler didn’t even realize he was crying until Josh was ushered past him, and shot him a lot of pure betrayal.

_ I should have done something. I could have stopped him. _

Alex was fighting with the principal, claiming he was only acting in “self defense,” but he didn’t seem to believe that one bit.

“Tyler!” Dallon’s arm slid around Tyler’s shoulders tightly. “Come on, let’s go sit down.” Tyler couldn’t find it in himself to speak, so he nodded instead, and allowed Dallon to gather up his stuff and take him to the choir room. He sat Tyler down on the risers, his arm still tightly around his shoulders. “Come on big guy, say something.”

“I shoulda done something Dallon,” Tyler whispered. His stomach clenched in his chest. “I coulda done something, but I couldn’t, I froze up and-” one hiccup was all it took before Tyler lost it and began to sob. “It’s my fault Dallon, it’s all my fault. I coulda done something, I coulda done something-”

“What could you really have done Tyler? Punched Alex in the face? You couldn’t have done that dude, that’s not like you. You’re too kind of a person. Plus, it would have given everything away. Everything you and Josh have worked for, poof. Gone. You couldn’t have done anything Ty.”

“He looked s-so betrayed, when, when he looked over at m-me,” Tyler couldn’t see straight he was crying so hard. He felt ridiculous that this was even happening.

Dallon hugged him tighter. “Tyler, you guys will get a chance to talk. I’m sure he’s not mad at you, it’s his fault for going to your lunch anyways. He knew what he was getting himself into. He took that chance anyways.” he sighed. “Tyler, our friends are dicks. We know that.”

“I know. I just, I can’t-”

“Do you wanna go home? I can call your mom for you.”

Tyler nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I wanna go home.”

With another sigh, Dallon patted Tyler’s back and reached for his phone.

\---

Tyler’s mother didn’t ask any questions when Tyler walked in through the front door. He walked straight into her arms and she held him for almost half an hour.

After that, he went up to his room and stared at his phone, his hands fiddling in his lap. Tyler couldn’t find himself to do anything else. He wanted to know if Josh was okay. He was waiting for him to call, text, anything.

Dallon told the coach he wasn’t coming to basketball, maybe Josh didn’t know that. Maybe he was waiting for Tyler to call. Tyler should call, to make sure Josh was okay.

And he was gonna call, really, but Josh beat him to it.

 

Joshua (12:44 pm)

 

_ Meet me @ Brendon’s house. Now. _

 

_ Know u went home _

 

Tyler’s breath lodged in his throat and he closed his eyes to calm himself down. Everything was okay, everything was okay. 

He didn’t bother to tell his mom he was going out, just grabbed his keys and went on his way to Brendon’s as fast as possible. His heart was racing. Josh sounded pissed. What if something was broken? 

“This is all my fault,” he mumbled under his breath, another fresh round of tears brimming his eyelids. Tyler cranked the radio as loud as he could and continued to speed on down the road. Everything was okay.

The driveway was empty when Tyler pulled up, which was no surprise there. Everyone was at school and most likely work. With a deep breath to prepare himself for what was to come, Tyler climbed out slowly and made his way to the door. His phone buzzed again.

 

Joshua (12:57 pm)

 

_ Door’s unlocked. Upstairs, on the roof. _

 

Tyler swallowed nervously and pushed his way inside the house slowly, the creaking door echoing throughout the empty living room. He made his way up the stairs, into the guest room, and through the open window onto the roof, where Josh was laying with his hands tucked behind his head. He looked bad.

His face was a mess of purple and blue and red, blood still caked in his eyebrows and matted in his hair. His nose was most definitely broken, swollen and dotted with swabs of purple. He had a black eye too. 

Josh looked tired.

Tyler felt like he was going to cry again as he crossed his legs and stared at his lap.

“I got suspended. Ten days.” Tyler didn’t say anything. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Josh moving into a better position. “I guess it makes sense. I did punch him first. Got a good one in there too. Think I really did some damage.” he chuckled, mostly to himself. “Alex only got three days though, so that’s fucking stupid.”

“I wanted to do something, please believe me.” Tyler finally gathered the courage to look up into Josh’s sad eyes. “I wanted to, but, but I just, froze. I know my friends are jerks, I know they are, but I’m too much of a coward to step up and call them out. I never knew he was gonna do that, but I know he’s always looking for a fight. I shoulda known.” the tears started falling and Tyler knew he looked ridiculous. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“Oh Ty.” Josh reached out to lay a hand on Tyler’s knee, and squeezed gently. “I don’t blame you for any of that.”

“But... but you looked so, so upset!”

“Well, of course I was pissed, but it wasn’t at you, I promise. I knew you couldn’t do anything. I knew it would only bring more trouble. You’re right man, I am getting reckless. The only reason I went out there was so I could see you since you couldn’t come to me. I should have known something stupid was gonna happen. That’s just my luck usually.”

“Alex is such a dick.” Tyler muttered. Josh’s eyes widened.

“What did you say?”

“I said he’s a dick.”

“Tyler, that’s a bad word.” his solemn look turned into a grin, causing Tyler to blush.

“Whatever. It’s not that bad of a word.”

“Yeah, you’re right.” he was back to being grim in seconds, and Tyler knew Josh had every reason to be. “I won’t be able to go to your next basketball game, you know, since I’m suspended and stuff. Technically not even allowed on school property.”

“Did they tell your parents?”

“Yeah. My mom came to pick me up. She brought me back here and that was the end of that. She knew I wasn’t going to talk so she didn’t bother.”

“What about the Urie’s?”

“I left Bren’s mom a voicemail. She’s not gonna be happy at all, but I guess I could only go for so long without telling anyone what really happened.”

“Josh...” Tyler trailed off, unable to formulate the rest of his sentence. He hated seeing Josh so sad and feeling so hopeless.

“No man, I’m serious. I got a lot of things wrong with me. I got a lot of things wrong with my family. I just have to explain to Mr. and Mrs. Urie the real reason why I’m staying with them. It’ll be a load off my chest anyways.” he forced a small smile. “I’m sorry Ty, I didn’t mean to bum you out. Brendon texted me saying you went home early because of me.”

“I was just worried, and stressed and stuff.” Except, you know, a little more than that.

“It’s called a panic attack. I get them too. It’s okay. And you know what? We’re going to get through this. Ten days is nothing.”

Tyler sighed. “I just wish things were normal. That I could tell my parents I was hanging out with you instead of lying to them, or we could hold hands in public without the fear that someone we know would see us, or that I could kiss you at school like all the other couples.”

“Yeah, that’d be nice, wouldn’t it?” Josh looked over at the skyline and the rooftops that never seemed to end. The sun disappeared behind a cloud. “Dallon told me you guys talked. About his relationship with Brendon.”

“Uh, yeah. I mean, it sort of makes sense. And having Dal know about us makes me feel a lot better.”

“Sorry I never told you. I just wanted you two to sort things out on your own.”

“Yeah, I get it.” Silence. Tyler’s eyes drifted back to Josh’s face. “On the bright side, you’ll have some sick battle wounds.”

Josh scoffed. “Yeah, that’s true.”

“Can you still, like, if we went into your room, could I still-” Tyler stopped himself. “Would it hurt? If we kissed?”

“Oh no. Definitely not.” A grin, an actual, real, giant grin, rose to Josh’s face as he slid down the roof and climbed back into his room, Tyler following suit. He could already feel his face heating up.

Tyler fell backwards onto Josh’s bed, Josh straddling him, his hands finding place on Tyler’s hips, thumbing the skin under his flannel. Tyler moaned softly, feeling around to Josh’s back, pushing down on the waistband of his sweats. That rush of adrenaline was back, the one that made him feel important, unstoppable, and on top of the world. Josh groaned loudly as he grinded against Tyler below him.

He sat up soon after that, numb fingers touching lips. “Okay, maybe I lied.”

“Oh gosh!” Tyler scrambled out from under Josh in seconds, his brow furrowed in worry. “Josh!”

“Dude, chill! I’m fine. Just sore.” he gently nudged Tyler over and burrowed under his comforter. “Could you stay, maybe? Just, lay with me?”

“Of course.” he peeled back one corner of the covers and snuggled closer to Josh, allowing him to tuck his arm around Tyler’s waist and press a small kiss to his forehead. He grimaced as Tyler shifted. “J?”

“I’m fine,” he muttered. Tyler didn’t believe Josh one bit. It took him all of three seconds to rip the duvet off and hike Josh’s shirt to his neck to see a string of bruises that ran the length of his stomach all the way up to his shoulders. Tyler stared as Josh pulled his shirt back down and sighed in annoyance.

“Josh-”

“I said I’m _ fine. _ Please, can we just forget about everything that happened today? I don’t want to think about it.” Tyler saw in that moment how frail Josh really could be, as the punk with the faded blue hair curled in on himself and hid under sheets and blankets. Tyler nodded, crawling back under, pulling himself as close to Josh as he could without hurting him. Josh was cold, his skin more pale than Tyler had ever seen, and he cried quietly, softly, the only evidence his tear stained pillow.

And in that moment, Tyler vowed to himself that he’d never let Josh get hurt ever again.


	11. Trouble in Paradise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Josh says some words that make Tyler upset. You won't believe what happens next.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy fuck it's been almost two years since I've updated this. I'm shit, so sorry
> 
> Here's some sex n drama bc you can't have a high school fic without it (and the last time this updated I was in frickin high school fuck me, I'm so sorry)
> 
> Promise I'm gonna finish this lol

Josh wasn’t himself after that fight in the cafeteria, and to Tyler, it came to be very obvious.

The first three days Tyler was fine with being at lunch because Alex was on suspension. Things were awkward; Dallon sat next to him out of support and no one really dared to talk about anything, besides Patrick who brought up the newest episode of  _ The Walking Dead. _ About a third of the table was gone, serving in-school suspension for “adding to the situation.”

After lunch, Dallon had walked Tyler to the STUCO room. “Tyler, I’m worried about you.”

“Why?” Tyler didn’t look up at Dallon and shoved his hands deeper into his pockets.

“Because I know you’re worried about Josh. Have you seen him recently?”

“No. Not since the day he got beat up.”

Dallon sighed. “Brendon’s parents weren’t happy.”

“I guessed that much.”

“They’re still letting him stay there though. Apparently, he told them the real reason Brendon had offered him into his home with open arms.”

“Right,” Tyler muttered, “I already knew that.”

“You wanna go over after practice with me? I bet he’s dying to see you.”

“Sure.” he’d tell his parents he was going to Dallon’s. “I’d like that.”

“Cool. Things are gonna get better Ty, I promise. Tomorrow, if you'd like, you can sit with me up in the library?"

A grin. “Yeah, I’d like that.”

“Sick.” Dallon smiled back. “See you later, Ty. Keep your chin up, sport.” he winked, and Tyler watched him walk back down the hallway, secretly wishing he could have had his best friend with him at all times.

Jenna beamed at Tyler as he slid his backpack off his shoulders and dropped into his chair. She had been out sick for the past week and a half and had completely missed the fight. He wondered if she even knew.

“Debby said Josh got the crap beat out of him last Friday,” she whispered, tucking her bangs behind her ear. Her nails were bright purple and obviously newly done. “Fill me in? I figured it’d be best to hear from someone who was there.”

“Oh uh, it was nothing.” Tyler busied himself by pulling out his computer and folders. Jenna scoffed.

“As if. Debby said Alex was pissed.”

“I don’t know why Alex was so angry. He’s the one that called Josh a bad name in the first place.”

Jenna’s eyes lit up at the gossip, and she was quickly engrossed. “A name so bad you’ll never say it?”

“I would never call a person that in the first place. It’s rude.” he blinked, looked around the room to make sure no one was listening, and leaned in. “The f-word. Not, like, the big one, but the term people call-”

Her eyes widened. “Oh my goodness!”

“Yeah. And he said a bunch of other things about the rumors going around the school.”

“About Josh being gay? He definitely is though, I told you that, right?”

“Well, that shouldn’t matter.”

“Tyler, people shouldn’t be gay. You know that; we’ve talked about it at church. Besides, Josh Dun is an asshole and a punk and a slacker and-”

“I know, I know. That doesn’t mean he should be getting beat up, right?”

“I dunno.” Jenna shrugged. “Maybe he sort of got what was coming to him.”

Tyler resisted his urge to scowl. He knew everyone thought he hated Josh just as much as the next guy, and as much as it pained him, he knew he had to stay quiet.

“Maybe,” he muttered instead, trying to relax his clenched jaw.

Tyler couldn’t have been happier when class started and Jenna shut up.

\---

It was at Brendon’s house that Tyler realized Josh was not okay. 

He was in his room buried under blankets when Tyler knocked on the closed door and pushed in. Josh peered at him from the top of his comforter and scooted up the bed. “Hey.”

Tyler ran a hand nervously through his freshly wet hair. “Hey.” he moved closer to sit on the end of Josh’s bed. “Have you moved all day?”

“No,” Josh murmured, looking at the wall. “Haven’t moved all week really.”

“Are you eating?”

“No.”

Tyler sighed. “Josh, you can’t do that to yourself.”

“Doesn’t really matter, does it? I’m the laughing stock at school. I’m the faggot nobody cares about. I know that for a fact. People keep texting me and telling me what’s going on at school. Everyone is talking about Alex beating the shit out of me. Everyone hates me.”

“Come on, that’s not true. I mean, you got a few good punches in-”

“Tyler, you don’t understand.” Josh was glaring now. “People don’t  _ hate you. _ People love you. Everyone fucking loves you. This is not just about the fight, this is about so much more. This has been something that’s been building and building and building.” he scoffed. “I can’t believe I ever thought I had a chance with you.”

“Josh--”

“Just leave me alone.” he turned towards the wall, and with pain across his face, Tyler left the room.

He was a coward, nothing but a big fat frickin’ coward.

\---

Alex came back, and the group chat filled with gossip and insult after insult shot Josh’s way. Tyler muted the chat.

He sat upstairs with Dallon in the library after giving the group some lie about studying for a history test and dropped his stuff down loudly, earning a glare from the librarian. Dallon frowned.

“Hey, what happened yesterday? You left pretty early.”

“Uh, nothing.” Tyler busied himself by pulling out folders and his computer. He figured he’d do his calc homework.

“Tyler, don’t lie to me.”

“You know Alex is down there right now talking about his fight with Josh. He’s probably calling Josh every name in the book. I know he’s mad, and like, what’s going to happen when Josh comes back to school?”

“Josh can handle his own. I doubt they’ll get into another fight.”

Tyler groaned. “I’m so stressed, Dal. School, basketball, Alex, this thing with Josh... I can’t take it anymore.”

“Hey man, can you please tell me what happened at Brendon’s?”

Tyler paused to look at his best friend and gave in with a big sigh. The least he could do was trust Dallon. Besides, talking about his problems had to be better than writing them down somewhere, right? “Josh... he’s not okay. He’s really upset about this whole situation. Yesterday... he told me to leave. Said he couldn’t believe he ever thought he had a chance with me. I don’t want him to feel that way. Dallon, I think...” Tyler sighed again and rubbed at his eyes with the heel of his hand. “I think I’m in love with him.”

“Oh, Tyler.” Dallon reached over to give Tyler a side hug, still very aware of the other people around them. “Things are going to be okay, I promise.”

“It doesn’t feel like it,” Tyler said back, and he ended the conversation there, his grip tight on his pencil as he tried to focus on his calculus homework instead.

\---

After his basketball game on Friday, Tyler headed to his car to leave, still in his jersey with a jacket tossed over it. The team was heading to some diner to go celebrate their win, but Tyler wasn’t in the mood.

The bright lights of the football field caught his eye, and the memories of spending time smoking with Josh made him smile. He had a sudden urge to visit the bleachers.

Tyler walked quickly, ignoring the sharp nip of the wind on his bare legs as he made his way to the track and over to the bleachers. He could hear laughter and voices, and only one look was all he needed to recognize the people.

Josh was gathered around with some of his friends; Tyler recognized Jack and Gerard (and figured Brendon was probably with Dallon) sitting with the familiar blue haired boy. He was going to say something but ducked instead when he caught a whiff of what they were smoking.

“Dude, we are going to get so  _ fucked _ if anyone finds us here,” Jack laughed, punching Josh playfully in the arm. Josh rolled his eyes.

“I’ll get the most fucked. I’m not supposed to be on school property for like, a few more days.”

“Like, ten days,” Gerard added, sticking his hand in the bag of Doritos on his lap. Josh shook his head.

“No, that was the whole suspension, idiot.”

“Oh.”

“How’s your relationship going, man?” Jack grinned. “Still getting fucked over by that pretty douche?”

“Ayy, you were dating a douche?” Gerard asked. Tyler assumed Josh hadn’t told him they were dating.

“I was just looking for a quick fuck anyways. Haven’t managed to get into his pants yet. He’s too much of a pussy for that.”

“Whatdya think Joseph’s dick looks like?” Jack’s grin grew bigger. Gerard let out a snort.

“Fuck man, you were dating  _ Joseph? _ As in, basketball point guard Tyler Joseph?”

“Fuck yeah!” Jack exclaimed, laughing. “Who woulda thought he was as gay as the rest of us? Bet his daddy would beat his ass if he found out his son was gay. Right, Josh?”

Josh’s response was to take a drag.

Gerard laughed again, flopping onto his back. “I bet his dick is fucking huge. Cause, he’s like, an athlete. Works out and stuff.”

“I don’t think that’s how it works bud,” Jack replied, patting Gerard on the head.

Josh shrugged. “If I can get him to let me suck his dick, I’ll let you guys know. Ten bucks say I can.”

The guys both started yelling, waving their hands all over the place, and Josh only laughed.  _ Laughed. _

Mortified, Tyler stumbled back from the bleachers, his face the color of a tomato. That couldn’t have been Josh under the bleachers. Josh was kind, and respectful, and not... not like that.

_ Yeah, he is. He’s always been like that. You know that. You know he’s just a rotten, no good punk. _

Tears were welling in his eyes as Tyler took off running back to his car. He felt ready to vomit. Did he really mean nothing to Josh? Was he nothing more than another guy for Josh to have sex with?

Tyler felt so stupid. He should have known he was nothing special to a guy who had sex all the time. With shaking hands Tyler started his car, let his phone clatter into a cupholder, and sped out of the parking lot, finally allowing his tears to fall. He should have never gone to the bleachers. He should have never allowed himself to get involved with someone like Josh Dun.

Tyler called Dallon, trying to control his sobs as the phone rang. The minute Dallon picked up, Tyler was in hysterics again.

“D-D-Dallon, I j-just h-heard J-Josh sayin’ I was nothing m-more than a guy to sleep with,” he blinked tears away and tried to focus on driving. Dallon sounded panicky.

“Tyler, I can’t understand what you’re saying. Did something bad happen?”

“Yes,” Tyler sobbed, dragging a hand down his face. Dallon sighed.

“Are you driving? Can you come over to Brendon’s house?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, I’ll be waiting for you. Drive safe, okay?”

“Yes,” Tyler said again as the phone clicked off. He tried to slow his tears, tried to tell himself he was being a big baby about this whole thing, but all Tyler could feel was pain. He knew he was in love with Josh, and he knew Josh didn’t feel the same way back.

\---

Dallon pulled Tyler into a hug the second that Tyler climbed out of his car. Tyler broke down into another round of tears.

He led Tyler upstairs and into Brendon’s bedroom where Brendon was sitting with an equally worried look on his face. He threw an arm around Tyler’s shoulders as Dallon sat down on Tyler’s other side.

“Ty, can you tell us what happened?”

Tyler sniffed and used the sleeve of his jacket to wipe away tears. “I uh, after the g-game,” a sniff, “I went to the football field, just cause I was thinking of Josh, and I heard him talking with his friends under the bleachers. They were all high I’m pretty sure, but Josh didn’t sound like he was that high. And he...” Tyler felt the burning of another set of tears in his throat and forced himself to ignore it. “He told them I was nothing more than a quick f-word. They kept talking about how big my...” he clenched his eyes shut and told himself to breathe. “Josh like, made a bet with them about sucking my... yeah.”

“That mother  _ FUCKER!”  _ Brendon yelled, jumping up from his bed to start pacing the room. “I’m going to kill him. I’m going to do a helluva lot worse than Alex ever dreamed he could.”

“Josh really said that?” Dallon seemed shocked. Tyler nodded and refused to look up from the floor. “I can’t believe it.”

“Josh is acting like a fucking bitch because he got beat up by fucking Alex Gaskarth. You know that kid could beat up anyone. He’s a fucking football player. And when Josh gets pissy, he acts like he’s some cool douche canoe from some shitty 80s movie. Like fucking Charlie Sheen in  _ Ferris Bueller. _ I’m going to beat his ass.”

“That doesn’t excuse his behavior,” Dallon started, and Brendon groaned in response.

“I’m not trying to defend him. He fucked up. He’s been acting pissy ever since he got suspended. Tyler, that’s not how he feels about you. I know how he feels about you. He’s fucking head over heels for you. He’d about cross the ends of the earth if you told him too. He’s only saying those things because he’s pissed and upset that he’s the laughing stock of the school. Big whoop. I was also the laughing stock of the school, sophomore year to be specific because everyone found out I sucked some kid’s dick in the bathroom. I got over it, and Josh will too. I’m going to beat some sense into him.”

“Tyler, do you wanna stay the night at my place? I don’t want you to be alone tonight.”

“Yeah,” Tyler whispered, pulling his sleeves over his hands.

“Tyler, I’m gonna talk to Josh, I promise. And I’ll make sure he apologizes for his shitty ass fucking behavior.” Brendon growled as he dropped back to the bed. “Sorry, Dal. I’m too pissed to have sex tonight.”

“Brendon, shut up,” Dallon rolled his eyes as he turned towards Tyler. “We weren’t going to have sex.”

“Sorry for ruining your night.”

“You didn’t ruin anything dude. Sorry Josh is an asshole. I’ll chew him out the second he comes home, okay?”

Tyler nodded. Dallon helped him stand up. “See you tomorrow Bren.”

Brendon muttered some response as Dallon and Tyler walked out to Tyler’s car. Brendon had picked Dallon up from the basketball game, so Dallon demanded that he drive. “You are in no condition to be driving and you know it,” he murmured. Tyler shrugged.

He slept horribly that night.

\---

The next morning Tyler drove home early after assuring Dallon over a hundred times that he was going to be just fine. He felt horrible, that was a no-brainer, but there wasn’t anything Tyler could do about it. He knew he wouldn’t be able to confront Josh.

“Hey sweetheart,” his mother said the minute he stepped into the kitchen through the garage door. “How was Dallon’s?”

“Alright,” Tyler replied, running a hand through his greasy hair. He hadn’t showered since practice on Thursday, and that had been two days ago. “I’m gonna go shower.”

“Okay. Your youth pastor called, by the way. He wants to know if you thought about that job offer he mentioned to you.” she smiled. “I would think hard about taking that offer. You’ll need to get a job over the summer to save for college.”

“Right. I’ll call him.”

“His number is on a post-it note on the fridge. Try and do that today, okay?”

“Yep,” Tyler muttered under his breath as he trekked up the stairs to the bathroom. After turning the water as hot as it would go, he stared at himself in the mirror for a good thirty seconds. Tyler concluded he was nothing more than another dumb jock to most people.

And nothing more than a bet to Josh.

With a sigh, Tyler pulled off his clothes and jumped in the shower.

\---

He had barely shut the door to his room when Zack burst in looking quite frazzled. Tyler pulled his towel tighter around his waist and furrowed his brow together.

“Dude, what’s wrong?”

“Tyler,  _ Josh Dun  _ is at the door.”

Tyler blinked. “Who?”

“You know, Josh Dun? Like, one of the most well known punks in the whole school? The guy who got suspended for having weed on him and who most recently just got his ass kicked by Alex? You complain about him all the time.”

“Oh, him.”  _ Why is he here? Go away. Go far away. _ Tyler sighed. He knew he was gonna have to make up some lie. “Uh yeah, he probably has a question about our English project or something.”

Zack scoffed. “Has he never heard of texting?”

“I don’t know. I’ll be down in a second, can you leave? Sort of trying to change here.”

“Yeah, don’t let him see you like that. He’s gay you know.” Zack grinned, and Tyler rolled his eyes.

“Get out idiot.”

“Okay, jeez. I’m going.” the door slammed shut behind Zack and Tyler went into full-fledged panic mode. Josh couldn’t be here. Tyler couldn’t talk to him. Brendon probably mentioned something and that was why Josh was now standing on his front doorstep.

_ Deep breaths, _ Tyler told himself as he shimmied into some basketball shorts and slid a t-shirt over his head. It stuck uncomfortably where he hadn’t finished drying off, too anxious to go tell Josh to leave him alone.

Tyler passed Zack on his way downstairs, who was still smirking. He scowled and pulled the door open.

Josh stood pushing his foot into the cement with his head down, his hair freshly dyed brown. Tyler could tell, because some strands were lighter than others, and his hair was curly beyond all belief. His bruises were also a little lighter, more yellow-brown than purple-blue. Josh looked up when the door creaked open.

“Leave, Josh,” Tyler said tiredly. He couldn’t be bothered with this, not after last night. “I don’t know why you’re here anyways. I had to lie to my brother to cover myself.”

“Look,” he started off, “I know I shouldn’t be here, but I wanted to talk to you in person. Please let me explain.”

“You don’t need to explain, you made yourself very clear what you think about me.” Tyler went to close the door, and Josh slammed his palm against it to stop him.

“Tyler please. Let me talk. Five minutes at least.”

“Yeah? Is that how long it’s gonna take for you to suck me off?” Tyler raised an eyebrow, venom in his tone, and it obviously surprised the punk. Josh sighed.

“I’m sorry Tyler, okay? There’s more to the story than me saying some shit with my friends. We can’t talk here, your parents or your brother or someone could hear.”

Tyler scowled, but he knew Josh was right. He closed the door briefly to slip on some shoes and shout that he was going to work on an English project before leaving the house to follow Josh to Brendon’s car. If he was being honest, Tyler was surprised Brendon had even let him borrow that. He had seemed pretty pissed last night.

Josh started talking the minute they pulled out of Tyler’s driveway. “Look, there are no excuses for what I said. I was a complete dick. I was just, like, pissed and stuff. Or as Brendon keeps calling me, pissy and an asshole. And he’s right. When I get pissed about things, I tend to spew shit I don’t mean. I try and act cool in front of my friends. I don’t know, we were doing drugs, I was a little buzzed, and I was being an asshole. I know I was. And you don’t have to forgive me, but I’m so fucking sorry Tyler. My friends don’t like you just as much as your friends don’t like me. I don’t even know what I was thinking.”

Tyler didn’t reply. He wasn’t even sure if he believed what Josh was saying.

“Tyler, you mean the world to me. These past months have been the most happy I’ve ever been. I don’t fucking care what anyone says about you because you are the greatest person I’ve ever met. You’re kind, you’re caring, you’re talented and athletic and smart and fucking  _ beautiful.  _ And Tyler, I’m in love with you. I’ve been in love with you since freshman year and it took me four years to get the balls to say something and I’m so sorry for being an asshole. I know I’m an asshole. But being around you, makes me feel like I can be a better person.”

Tyler blinked, trying to take all of Josh’s words in. “You... you love me?”

“Fuck yeah I do. I don’t see you as a bet Tyler. You are so much more than that to me. Like, I can’t see myself with anyone else.”

“Dude, we’re teenagers. Don’t Romeo and Juliet the situation.”

Josh snorted. “I’m sorry for being dramatic, it’s just like, you’re the first person my heart has ached over. You’re the first person I’ve been so infatuated with I’ve been scared to talk to you. And I know we belong to different cliques and I know I thought I never had a chance with you, but now that I do, I can’t, I can’t let you go Tyler. And I fucked up so badly. If now is the time I lose you, I will never forgive myself.”

“What you said really hurt.”

“I know Ty, and I’m so sorry.”

“You are kind of an a-hole, but I’ve always known that.” he smiled a little as Josh scoffed. “I know I was being really sensitive, and I know I’m pretty closeted, but Josh, I think I’m in love with you too. You’re the only person I can turn towards to talk about my life and the crazy things going on. You, you’re just so  _ easy _ to trust. And I do trust you.”

Josh jerked the car into a neighborhood. “You do?”

“Yeah, I do. You’re sorta teaching me how to be a teenager.”

“I really don’t care about the sex, you know that, right? As long as I get to be with you, I don’t care.”

“I know Josh. You’re kind.”

He sighed with relief. “So... we good?”

“Yeah. We’re good.” Tyler grinned, his heart settling. “Did we just have our first fight?”

“I guess we did.”

“Soooo... should we make out to make up?”

Josh laughed. “That doesn’t sound too bad.” he parked his car on the side of the road and unbuckled swiftly, using a thumb to gesture to the back of the car. Tyler nodded, and ungracefully tumbled into the back seat. Josh straddled him, wasting no time to kiss him softly, his teeth grazing Tyler’s bottom lip.

“Your hair looks good by the way,” Tyler mumbled against Josh’s mouth, his hands sliding under Josh’s shirt. Josh chuckled.

“Knew you liked the brown.”

“I do.” Tyler groaned as Josh grinded against him. He could feel himself growing hard, admittedly a little embarrassed it required practically no effort.

“Fuck Tyler, make that sound again.” Josh moved down his jaw, and Tyler threw his head up so fast he hit the window, this time groaning in pain. Josh didn’t seem to notice this time though, immediately going back to kissing Tyler’s neck. “God, I love you.”

One of Josh’s hands slid into Tyler’s shorts and gripped his ass tightly. Tyler squeezed his eyes shut, his face blossoming into a bright shade of red. Josh made an effort to use his frickin’ thighs as some sort of iron clamp, and Tyler knew by now that he had a full on boner and no way of hiding it.

“Crap,” he muttered out loud. Josh sat up, quickly pulling his hand out of Tyler’s shorts.

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m just uh,” he gestured to his crotch, “a little excited is all. Sorry.”

Josh scoffed. “I knew I could feel it.” A smug grin rose to his face as he rested his hands loosely above the waistband. “Can I?”

“Uh...” Tyler had never, like, done this before, and the idea of showing someone his  _ dick _ was a little scary. “I don’t-”

“It’s up to you man, I just know a better way of relieving some of that pressure. You’ve jerked off before, right?”

“No...”

Josh’s eyes widened. “Well, fuck dude, you really are innocent.” he shook his head. “Lemme just...” he slowly pulled basketball shorts to mid-thigh and paused, staring heavily at the bulge in Tyler’s boxers and the tiny wet spot bleeding through. “Whaddya do to get it to go away?”

“I dunno, take a cold shower or something.”

“You’ve never watched porn?”

“No!” Tyler replied in horror at the thought of watching that.

“Tell me how you feel right now.”

“Uh, tight.”

Josh snorted as he leaned back down to softly kiss Tyler once more. “Look baby--”

Tyler felt worse. “Oh gosh--”

“You like that, huh?” Josh bit down on the loose skin underneath Tyler’s jaw, and smiled when Tyler moaned quietly. He fumbled to get Tyler’s shirt off, and the jock happily helped. “Feel that?” he used his thumb to press down on a nipple. Tyler’s eyelids slammed shut again.

“Screw it,” Tyler shouted to nobody. “Go for it.”

It took Josh all but three seconds to pull off Tyler’s boxers. His eyes widened at the sight of a (large) flushed pink cock. Josh wanted to say something about the size, but kept his mouth shut, his eyes flickering everywhere to take everything in. Tyler cracked an eyelid open.

“This is awkward,” he whispered. Josh snapped out of his daze.

“I’m going to make you feel incredible.” Josh rolled up his sleeves and ducked his head, Tyler yelping the minute he felt a cold tongue press to the inside of his thigh. His hands flailed out and grabbed the first thing he could find; which, of course, happened to be Josh’s hair.

And the minute Josh’s entire  _ mouth _ was wrapped around Tyler’s dick, Tyler couldn’t keep his sounds to himself.  _ This is what I’ve been missing out on? Holy crap. _

Tyler felt incredible. This was a sensation that to him couldn’t be described by words. He was getting a  _ blowjob _ for goodness sake; if this was what it was like now, what was going to happen when the two of them had full on sex? He couldn’t picture that. He couldn’t picture anything, because at the moment his mind was a black screen.

Then, Tyler felt panic. He learned enough in his sex ed class to know what was coming next.

Josh pulled off, his hair sticking up in about fifteen different directions and his lips ruby red. Immediately a hand wrapped around and base of Tyler’s dick and stroked upwards. “It’s alright baby, come on.” Josh chuckled at himself. “Ha! I made a pun.”

Tyler groaned, both at Josh’s horrible joke and in his own discomfort/comfort. (Really, he was having a hard time describing what was happening to him.) All at once, Tyler relaxed as he came, Josh pushing through his orgasam. He wiped his hand off on his shirt and used Tyler’s boxers to clean up the rest of the mess.

“How’d  _ that _ feel?” Josh asked as he tossed Tyler back his clothes. Tyler felt like he was floating on a cloud.

“Really, really great.”

“Told you.”

“Yeah.” Tyler grinned. “You did.”


End file.
